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The wait is over!
We are very proud to announce the release of the 1st episode of "The Path of Light" documentary.
Episode 1: "Generation of Dreamers" focuses on Celestron's founder, Tom Johnson, an electrical engineer, who developed the techniques for mass producing Schmidt-Cassegrain Telescopes, making these powerful astronomical instruments accessible to amateur astronomers.
Hello fellow CelestronLife members! This is my first post in this blog, so I thought I'd share an awesome story from today.
This morning, I left for college at 9am. My college is kinda far, all the way in Queens, NY. I got to my college around 9:40am. I decided to go to the student lounge and just wait around for my class. Not too long after I received a phone call from my mom, telling me that this big box came this morning (not too long after I left for school). Unfortunately, I was stuck in my college all day, so I was awaiting the moment until I'd get home! My dad finally came to pick me up at around 4:40pm, and I was on the way home. And with the terrible traffic, it took a little over an hour to get home. I finally got home, and saw this big box staring at me. Knowing that my parents weren't awaiting anything that big, I decided to take it upstairs to my room and check it out! Of course, while dragging it up the stairs, I got stuck on the stairs cause the box was too big for the staircase. I got a help from my dad, and we carried it to my room. There I was left alone with the box again. Then I had only one question......
So I decided that I might as well, just open the box and take a good look at what is inside. I cut the yellow lines, and then I had to cut the tape of the box. It was weird, cause one side of the box was really heavy, and the other side was really light. What kind of an unbalanced thing could it be, huh? Made me wonder for a little while.... So as I was opening it, I noticed a box in a box. Strange.. who sends a box in a box? Well, I opened the flaps of the brown cardboard box and I saw this big beautiful box with a really nice picture...... The box in a box happened to be a ..............
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AstroMaster 130EQ-MD!
I jumped for joy! This unbalanced heavy box happened to be a telescope! A good telescope for an amatuer. I took the blue Celestron box out of the brown box, basically dragged it out of the brown box, cause the blue Celestron box was pretty heavy.... So I took it out, and took the cover off of the blue box. And what do you know..... there were more boxes!
So I was digging through them, and found some really interesting things. Two of the small boxes were extremely heavy, and I thought my hand was gonna fall off. But I took all the boxes out, and started opening them! I jumped more with joy. But the real "fun" was gonna be to actually put this together. That's probably the least favorite part in this thing. So I was taking all these different things out of these million boxes..... I called my dad for help, who left me not too long after, because he was beyond confused. That left me and the telescope together, and me trying to put this together. Well, it was assembled together, but was it assembled together correctly? Oh I hope so.... My final image is an image of this beautiful blue telescope
And please excuse the mess in my room behind the telescope. Now I'm gonna have fun with this, most likely next weekend, since there are a couple more tests.... But hopefully I'll be looking up at the sky next weekend, and hopefully I'll be able to locate stars/planets/nebulae, etc. Unfortunately, I have this sucky out-of-print Nikon CoolPix 4100 which won't work for my AstroPhotography which I hope to master someday (soon, of course). For now, I'll either take "okay" videos of the moon, plus I'll have to ask my brother to take some awesome photographs with his Nikon D70.
Last but not least, I have to thank one of our own CelestronLife's member Justin who I bombarded with my Astronomy questions, and who helped me to make sure I got the right scope that is good enough for me. And of course, ask him any question I wanted and I'd always get an answer:)
Now I'm off to play with my brand new toy.. or maybe more of like try and attempt to learn all of this stuff and how to use it. Where have my memories from Astronomy 105 & 106 have gone?? One year of Astronomy, and I still lack all the info I learned. At least I saved my $120 astronomy book, and dug it out a few days ago. I know it would be useful someday!!!! Starting today....someday IS the today!
-EvaCZE 
With sand, water, stars and sky, the 13th Annual Astronomy at the Beach took place September 25 and 26, 2009 at Maple Beach, Kensington Metro Park, Milford, MI. Astronomy at the Beach, more commonly known as AATB, is a yearly event hosted by the Kensington Metro Park and the Great Lakes Association of Astronomy Clubs (GLAAC) - the Ford Amateur Astronomy Club, Warren Astronomical Society, The Astronomy Club at Eastern Michigan University, University Lowbrow Astronomers, Oakland Astronomy Club, Seven Ponds Astronomy Club, Sunset Astronomical Society and the Amateur Astronomers of Jackson. Major sponsors for AATB 2009 included Cranbrook Institute of Science, Co-op Services Credit Union, Camera Mart, Rider's Hobby Shops, Detroit Science Center and Celestron. AATB is unquestionably Michigan's largest public outreach astronomy event drawing thousands upon thousands of guests each year that are eager to learn about astronomy, space and science. Many Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, elementary, middle school, high school and college aged students attends the event in droves to learn and enjoy anything and everything about astronomy! Guests also have the opportunity to observe through telescopes, listen in on exciting astronomy talks or just being around anyone else sharing the same interest in astronomy.
Celestron's Marketing Coordinator, Yasmine Rios, and I flew out to Michigan and represented Celestron at this year's AATB event. While back home in Los Angeles, our colleagues attended the big Pacific Astronomy and Telescope Show (PATS), which also took place the same weekend. We teamed up with Rider's Hobby Shop's John Kirchhoff and Bob Justin, to display and demo our telescopes and astronomy related products for the guests. Rider's Hobby Shops also helped to organize a children's treasure hunt, where kids were encouraged to view at least 6 different celestial objects through telescopes and learn more about what they saw from telescope operators. Children also had to answer astronomy related questions and once completed (with or without help), were submitted in to receive prizes. What a fun way to learn about astronomy!
Cloudy conditions graced Friday night's sky compromising telescope viewing somewhat, but that didn't seem to put too much of a damper on people's spirits. Guests were still gathering at the beach while excellent talks were taking place inside the main tent, many of which were aimed at families and children. It wasn't uncommon to hear laughter coming from the tent throughout the evening. Sky and Telescope's Editor-in-Chief, Robert Naeye and Rider Hobby Shop's John Kirchhoff were among many excellent speakers that presented that evening. The Detroit Science Center brought along an inflatable, portable planetarium with a star projector which provided tours of the night sky. It proved to be a big hit with all the kids and parents alike. Yasmine and I wanted to go inside and see the planetarium show too, but the line was too long. Maybe next year! Next door at the Ford Amateur Astronomy Club's table, members sold cool, colorful, bendable glow sticks. It was quite a sight of seeing these colorful "bracelets" worn on people's head, neck and wrists while "floating" about in the darkness. AATB definitely wasn't a dark sky party, but it didn't have to be to learn all about the cosmic wonders of our universe, and having a great time too!
On Saturday afternoon, I presented a talk to GLAAC members at the Kensington Metro Park's Nature Center. The topic - Celestron's Community Relations and an overview of Celestron's new optical system - the EdgeHD. Highlights from "Celestron On-The-Go" included - IYA events, dealer shows and major star parties that we had participated in during the year. Other topics included an overview of Celestron's social networking sites - CelestronLife.com and CelestronImages.com. In addition, I really wanted to emphasize who we are as a company, and who we are as employees. With Celestron on the verge of celebrating its 50th Anniversary in 2010, we are moving forward and will be sharing in the celebration with our loyal customers and fans.
Before the start of Saturday's AATB event, Yasmine and I took a tour of parts of Kensington Metro Park's 4,481 acre grounds and marveled at all the great things to see and do here. Although time was extremely limited, we did see many key features of the park including - hiking trails, picnic areas, wooded forests, wetlands, beach areas, wildlife viewing and so much more! Autumn foliage was beginning to take shape, as leaves began dressing in their finest reds and orange colors. We stopped at the Farm Center for a few minutes to visit some of the local farm animals including sheep, pigs, chickens, goats, cows and turkeys. Coming from a big city, we really do not have many opportunities to see farm animals, so it was a wonderful experience. What a thrill it was for Yasmine to see her favorite horses and sheeps up close.
While clouds were once again predicted for Saturday night's viewing, by late afternoon, the clouds miraculously parted just enough that left enough visible sky to commence the evening star party to the delight of everyone in attendance. By dusk, the viewing area began to fill up with people, as telescopes of every make and model adorned the beach. The Quarter Moon gracefully lit up the sky, and people pointed out the bright "star" like object in the sky - Jupiter! As expected, the vendor and astronomy club's area remained busy, but the majority of the crowds were out observing on the beach. It was truly delightful to see so many people from every age group interested in astronomy and excited to observe through many telescopes set up that evening. One example which stands out in my mind took place at Eastern Michigan University's C14 setup - after viewing through the telescope, a young girl excitedly ran back to her parents and yelled out "I think I saw M13!"
AATB 2009 officially came to an end at the stroke of midnight that Saturday night. A raffle drawing took place in the outdoor pavilion immediately after for those who worked or helped plan the event. Several great raffle prizes were donated by many of the event's sponsors including gift certificates, DVDs, eyepieces and telescopes. The grand prize was a Celestron NexStar 4 SE that Celestron had donated
Yasmine and I left Detroit the following day and flew home with an abundance of great memories of AATB and of all the friendly and enthusiastic people we had met throughout the 2 day event. We would like to personally say "Thank You" to Greg Ozimek, official photographer of AATB, for initially contacting and inviting Celestron to participate; George Korody, of the Ford Amateur Astronomy Club, for providing us with information regarding AATB at the Florida WSP; John Kirchhoff, Manager, Rider's Hobby Shops, for supporting, supplying and transporting our products; the entire Greater Lakes Association of Astronomy Club's officers and club members for their dedication towards public outreach and for banding together to host this wonderful family oriented event for the community; and Kensington Metro Park for providing an outstanding nature venue to hold AATB. We hope to see you all again at next year's AATB.
Hello fellow CelestronLife members!
I finally went out last night (Thursday October 29, 2009) to see the first quarter moon. The weather has been still weird, even during the summer..that thing called "new telescope curse" is really lasting way too long. This year the weather is just horrible, so I haven't had many chances to look up at the sky. Yesterday, I was out for most of the day and part of the evening. My mom wanted to return something to a local pharmacy so that was our last stop. It was a little after 6pm (still light outside) and I've noticed that the Moon is out! I decided that if we get home while it is still light outside I will take some during-the-day photos of the Moon. But of course I got home around 7pm and it was dark out. I checked if I can use my telescope from the backyard to see the Moon cause I really didn't feel like being on the front lawn front of the house.. So around 7:30pm, I dragged my telescope out to the backyard to my "secret observatory"!
First I used the 20mm eyepiece and tried to take photos. They were all becoming so blurry that I was getting pissed that I can't take any decet pictures. I managed to take only a few pictures with that.. here is one
Then for some reason I decided to use the 10mm eyepiece.... which I NEVER use for some reason. Most likely cause I think since it's a lower #, it will show a smaller imagine. But once I located the Moon again, I was stunned how big the Moon looked with the 10mm eyepiece. All this time I neglected it cause I thought it was worse than the 20mm, but now I see it's actually better! So for the rest of the night, I used the 10mm eyepiece. I took many many photos. They actually came out better... much much better! There is a big improvement in my astrophotography from last time, which makes me happy:) Here is one of the close ups
Then I decided, for fun, to play around with the color settings on my digital camera.. so I took a sepia toned Moon and cyanotype toned Moon.
And then some really awesome close ups! I also took many many videos. Some of them are close up, some of them are REAL close ups. I used the 10mm eyepiece for that as well. These pictures are in a bigger size on my profile, and a video as well. So feel free to check them out and comment:) I will also be getting Moon filters soon so I won't be blinded by the brightness of the Moon. I'm very happy about the outcome of my pictures since I was already getting worried they won't be as good. Now just have to get a better digital camera :-)
-EvaCZE
Hi everyone!
I finally got a chance to take out my telescope for the first time since I've received it..which was 3 weeks ago! Unfortunately, the weather hasn't been all that great, so tonight was my chance. It was a beautiful day with 60 degrees and cloudless skies. At night, it turned to 40 degrees with cloudless skies. So of course, I decided to get out into my backyard and just randomly look around, since I am not 100% familiar with the use of telescopes. I camped out in my backyard at 11pm (April 9th), to be exact I took my telescope out on the deck by the pool to be up higher.
And then I decided to move the telescope down on the ground, cause it will be much more stable than the deck. I rotated my telescope so I could see the moon! Of course it was a full moon, so I couldn't really stare at the moon through the eyepiece for too long, cause it would blind me (I'll have to get those filters)!! And then I decided, that even though my digital camera isn't so great, I'll attempt to take a picture of the Moon! I took a few, but only one was a decent one! I didn't use the piggy mount for my camera, I don't have any mounts to hold the camera to take the picture, I was holding my Nikon CoolPix 4100 with my hand, right up in the eyepiece. And actually came out with a decent picture :) Don't even ask how I did this, but somehow it happened
The Moon
April 9th, 2009. AstroMaster 130EQ-MD w/ Nikon CoolPix 4100
Then I spent until 2am talking to my brother on the phone, asking what I should do and where I should move it. Then had some troubles aligning it and actually finding what I wanted to. The moon was TOO bright, and lit up a lot of the sky. Plus it was very light polluted already, so it was hard to see! But either way, Im glad I got one decent moon picture, since it was the biggest thing in the sky! I packed up by 2am, and went back inside. So this is my first astronomy night with my own telescope:)))
EvaCZE
I've been a visual astronomical observer for more than 30 years. For me, there's nothing better than gazing through the eyepiece and exploring the Lunar landscape, Saturn's ring divisions, the wispy clouds of the Orion nebula and so much more. If you're like me, you've probably also spent many hours gazing through astronomy books and magazines in awe of all those magnificent color photos depicting deep space objects in mystical blues, pinks and a variety of other colors. I often asked myself "how do astrophotographers take images like that?" Imaging always seemed really complicated, and I figured those that do imaging must have lots of patience, lots of free time on their hands, own high end equipment, have access to dark skies and perhaps have a background in photography. With the advancement of today's modern imaging technology, imaging is becoming more mainstream and accessible to amateur astronomers, not to mention, getting easier and easier to learn. Last September at the Pacific Astronomy and Telescope Show (PATS) held in Pasadena, CA, I met up with my old friend, Dean Koenig, owner of Starizona. Dean said "Kevin, hey man, you have to check out my new HyperStar Assembly for the NexStar 6 SE." "It rocks man!" Out of curiosity, I checked out the images Dean displayed on his monitor, and I was literally blown away with some of the first test images taken through a NexStar 6 SE equipped with a HyperStar lens assembly and a CCD camera! Images of the Horsehead, Orion and Veil nebulas stood out in all their colorful glory with nebulosity filling the screen! What made it even more mind blowing, was the fact that on some of the images, no guiding or wedge alignment were used! The results were truly spectacular! Why? Because HyperStar imaging takes advantage of short exposures (20-30 seconds), so shots can be taken unguided. Since the NexStar 6 SE is forked mounted, short exposures also meant not having to use a wedge to polar align the scope. Talk about simplistic! Of course, if someone wanted to take longer exposures, then yes, guiding would be necessary (to adjust for tracking errors), as well as polar aligning (to combat field rotation). But for someone who's a beginner and wants to learn the easiest way to capture deep-sky objects the first night out and get amazing images, HyperStar can be the answer.
So what exactly is HyperStar imaging? According to Dean, HyperStar is a multiple correcting lens element which takes the place of an SCT's secondary mirror. Unless the scope is already HyperStar compatible, like the Nexstar 6 SE, the scope's secondary housing must be converted to accept the HyperStar lens assembly (conversion kits are available for those that are not). The secondary mirror is removed, and the HyperStar lens assembly is then screwed in its place. This allows for extremely fast CCD imaging. For the NexStar 6 SE, it's focal ratio is reduced to f 1.9 (31 times faster than imaging at f 10). A CCD camera is then attached to the HyperStar, and used in conjunction with an imaging program like Maxim DL 5, for example, to capture, stack, color convert and save the images. Dean says "it just doesn't get any simpler than that!" To learn more about HyperStar imaging, I spent a few nights at Starizona to hangout with the imaging guru himself. Dean and his staff conducts imaging sessions every clear Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday evenings right in his parking lot. I was concerned that cars from an adjacent road, Tucson's light pollution, lights from a neighboring Salvation Army, Circle K and a Waxing Moon would hamper the imaging session somewhat, but I was assured capturing good images were inevitable. Dean covered all the basics with me from properly installing the HyperStar Assembly with my Starlight Xpress SXVF-H9C One-Shot Color CCD Camera. He then covered how to collimate the HyperStar to get pinpoint star images (which is essential for sharp images) and how to rotate the camera for the best image orientation. Using Maxim DL 5, I learned how to set presets for finding stars for alignment, focusing, taking test shots and more. Video tutorials which covers these steps are available to download off Starizona's website. These video tutorials really help out a lot. Because the secondary mirror is replaced by the HyperStar lens assembly, my laptop screen served as the "eyepiece" and I went ahead and conducted my normal telescope Sky-Align alignment procedure and centered the alignment stars as I would if I was using the eyepiece. My first target was the Orion Nebula. I took 12 exposures at 20 seconds each that seem like a good starting point. During processing, I could always "throw out" any bad images that showed less than perfect stars. Next, I entered in the coordinates for Comet Lulin and in a matter of seconds, Comet Lulin appeared on my laptop screen in black and white (color conversion is done during processing). It's really amazing how sensitive a CCD camera can be because the comet was already beyond naked eye visibility. I went ahead and made my exposures for the comet. High level clouds began streaming into sky, so we headed back inside the store, where Dean showed me how to stack and make adjustments to the images using the stretch and histogram features in Maxim DL 5. This is where the user takes control and adjusts the color, brightness, etc, to their liking. There really isn't a right or wrong way, as everyone has different preferences. To be honest, it did take some time to make necessary adjustments to get the image to my liking, but it was well worth the extra time. Please keep in mind that I'm a beginner to imaging and just learning the ropes, but I'm pleased at the results I obtained using HyperStar through a NexStar 6 SE in Alt/Azm with Dean to guide me. Despite all the light pollution and Moonlight, my images looked almost like I took them from a dark sky site! It was nothing short of amazing! I never could imagine imaging being this fun and this easy! The next clear night, we were right back at imaging from his parking lot with several popular star clusters in sights, and once again, we had a blast.
I'm sure the main question most people have on their minds is - Is HyperStar imaging affordable? Well, that's rather subjective, but I have noticed CCD cameras becoming more available and more affordable with improved features than ever before. For me, it was time to take the plunge to learn how to image using the HyperStar method, and I'm glad I did. I'll be heading back to Arizona one of these nights when the sky is clearer and the Moon is out of the way to learn more about HyperStar imaging, and take it to the next level. Before I left, Dean said "you haven't seen nothing yet, and be prepared to get less sleep from this point on." I think he's right. For more information on HyperStar imaging, visit the Starizona website at www.starizona.com. There's also a dedicated HyperStar website at www.hyperstarimaging.com. A spectacular image of Comet lulin taken with a HyperStar C11 was selected for the Astronomy Picture of the Day. A link can be found on Starizona's homepage. Now if you'll excuse me, there's a clear sky tonight, and I have more imaging practice to do.
When the clock struck midnight on January 1, 2010, Celestron reached a new milestone in its storied history by celebrating 50 years of optical and mechanical innovations in telescope manufacturing. What better way of starting off the new year than by "kicking off" the celebration at the largest and most well known gathering of the latest in electronic gadgets and technology breakthroughs - the Consumer Electronics Show (CES). Held at the convention center in fabulous Las Vegas, NV, the event drew more than 2,500 technology oriented companies from around the world, CES is the undisputed king of tradeshows.
Celestron attended the convention with a full contingent of representatives from the president & CEO, Joe Lupica, to his staff representing Engineering, Marketing and Sales Departments. For the first time, Celestron had a booth set up inside the main central hall, alongside some of the biggest giants in the electronics industry. This year, our Marketing Department came up with a rather unique looking booth structure which swayed radically away from the more traditional booth setups around. At first glance, one could not help but notice the appearance of a futuristic galactic structure, reminiscent of a planetarium or even the LAX theme building. Looking up, a huge mural of the Whirlpool Galaxy (M51) graced the ceiling of our booth, which gave our guests, an uncanny feeling of voyaging out into space and traveling amongst the stars! The center of the booth was purposely kept open to give guests a more welcoming invitation to come in for a look. It was really cool. Well done Marketing!
CES is always an ideal time to debut new and exciting products to start off a brand new year. For 2010, we proudly displayed several new products lines, including several handheld magnifiers and a complete lineup of weather stations. For our binocular and spotting scope categories, we introduced the new UpClose No Focus binoculars; a new state-of-the-art, fully multi-coated, BAK-4, Nature Series binoculars; a 25x70 Porro SkyMaster binocular; a new C90 Mak; an Electric Zoom spotting scope and a Travel Scope 50. The telescope lineup included several new models such as the new entry level LCM telescope line - available in 60, 80 and 114 aperture sizes; a revamped NexStar SLT line - now with 90 and 127 Maksutov-Cassegrain optics; a limited edition, orange colored 50th Anniversary FirstScope series and a limited edition 50th Anniversary CPC 800 series - with a glossy carbon fiber optical tube, 50th Anniversary badging and gold eyepiece kit. A CGE Pro 1400 HD, equipped with a DSLR camera, stood gracefully at the front corner of our booth which attracted many of the uninhibited. On more than several occasions, it wasn't uncommon to hear people say "that's one heck of a telescope!"
Several new products were recognized and received Innovation Honorees awards in the Personal Electronics category this year at CES. These items included our Aplanatic Schmidt-Cassegrain optical system - the Edge HD - which alleviates off-axis coma and delivers astrograph quality pinpoint star images across a wide field; the LCD Deluxe Digital Microscope with the first 3.5" touch screen and 180 degree rotatable head - makes it perfect in a classroom setting; and finally, the upcoming LCD Handheld Digital Microscope with a 2.4" touch screen that's easy to use for children and educators. All three products were proudly displayed at the Innovations Design and Engineering Awards showcase in the main central lobby.
Our booth featured two flat screen monitors that played Celestron video clips for the duration of the convention. We've concentrated and produced videos during 2009, and will continue to do so into 2010 and beyond. One of the monitors, featured a touch screen which enabled guests to view our new 50th Anniversary mini-site. This site came complete with an interactive time-line, presented the latest news, videos, celestial images, photos and even had a guest book for people to sign. Visitors were also able to view a "sneak peek" trailer of our upcoming documentary titled "The Path of Light" which will be a 6 part mini-series that takes a closer look into the world of Celestron, its employees, astronomy, telescope making, public outreach and more. Additional highlights will include interviews with professional observatories and even rock and roll stars! Our guests even had the chance to submit their names for a chance to win one of the limited edition orange colored 50th Anniversary FirstScope. At times, the line to submit names for the drawing became quite long, but nobody seem to mind much. The FirstScope is not only a fully functioning 76 mm reflector telescope, but is quite attractive and will definitely become a collector's item. See for yourself in the photo below.
After the conclusion of Friday's show, Celestron hosted a dinner party for their dealers, distributors and special guests at The Palm Restaurant inside Caesars Palace. It was a very festive atmosphere with everyone having a great time catching up on the latest news in the industry, while making new acquaintances or reestablishing old ties. After working the booth for several days, everyone looked forward for the evening's social and to enjoy a delicious meal. President Lupica led off the evening with a motivational speech and a toast for having a successful 2009. Although the economy was harsh for many industries, Celestron continued to pull through and keep growing, while taking on a more aggressive approach to all facets of the business. When the evening came to an end, everyone posed for photos, and each guest was given a goody bag which included a 50th Anniversary t-shirt, cap and commemorative pin. What a great way to start off the anniversary celebration in the new year.
The rage at CES 2010 was unquestionably 3D HD Technology that was announced from nearly all the major TV manufacturers in the industry. Everywhere I looked; 3D HD demonstrations were being conducted outside on smaller screens and on giant theaters erected inside the convention center. Sampling some of the 3D action myself, I was quite impressed at what I saw, especially having watched Avatar recently in IMAX 3D. It's amazing how fast technology keeps evolving year after year, and the optimism and enthusiasm it creates by building excitement among manufacturers and consumers alike. It makes me contemplate - what is the next frontier for Celestron? It's been a very successful 50 years, and it's inevitable that we're already looking into the future to integrate new technology into our products. Am I excited? You bet I am!
Imagine for a moment of being on a tropical island chain in the middle of the Pacific Ocean where the sea meets the sky in an annual celebration of astronomy and native culture. It must be AstroDay Hawaii!! The 8th annual AstroDay Hawaii took place on May 2, 2009 at the Prince Kuhio Plaza in Hilo, Hawaii. AstroDay is the brainchild of former Subaru Telescope Operator and current Public Outreach Officer for the Institute of Astronomy at the University of Hawaii , Gary Fujihara. As the story goes, one day Gary had learned about Astronomy Day from the Astronomical League's website and decided to use Astronomy Day as a way to help educate the public and bring an understanding for all the scientific research being conducted atop the summit of Mauna Kea. One of his major goals for the event was to inspire youngsters to become interested in science and math at an early age. At the same time, blend in a mix of Hawaiian culture and thus, the creation of AstroDay Hawaii began. Today, with the tireless efforts of many people, AstroDay brings together astronomers, engineers, scientists, astronomy clubs, Hawaiian groups, celebrities, musicians, telescope manufacturers, schools, media and more with one goal in mind - to bring astronomy to the people, especially the children.
Because both of my parents were born and raised in Hilo, Hawaii, it was only natural for me to take notice of this special event, especially since I had a long time fascination with astronomy and science since my early childhood. A few years ago, I journeyed back to the islands to not only see my relatives again, but to also see what AstroDay Hawaii was all about. One of the first things I noticed was how organized the event was since it took place inside a big shopping mall. With every center of the walkways filled with exhibits and thousands upon thousands of people in attendance, I realized that this was a well coordinated event that took a lot of effort from everyone involved to make it happen. No doubt, astronomy is big here in Hawaii. What also impressed me was seeing professional astronomers from some of the biggest astronomical observatories in the world taking the time to speak with youngsters and explained what they did for a living in a way the kids could understand. Some observatories had interactive children's activities that helped make learning about science fun, while another observatory brought their own portable planetarium to help teach about the nightsky. I knew right away this would be a great event for Celestron to help sponsor and participate in when resources became available.
As a sponsor of AstroDay with Astronomy Magazine, Marketing Manager, Michelle Meskill and I flew into my family's hometown to participate in this year's AstroDay Hawaii event. With time to spare before the big event, we visited my relatives, as I showed Michelle what the local lifestyle was really all about. We then had lunch at Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park, visited the Mauna Loa Macadamia Nut factory and toured the Imiloa Astronomy Center of Hawaii, which we highly recommend to anyone visiting the Big Island who's interested in astronomy. The next day, the sky was as clear as could be. It's as if the Hawaiian Gods purposely cleared the sky just in time for AstroDay! Hilo is notoriously known for its rain. The view of Mauna Kea, with its observatories overlooking Hilo Bay, was definitely a Kodak moment. This would be the first time Celestron officially participated at AstroDay. Our table was placed near center stage in a prime location. Assistant AstroDay Organizer, Kenyan Beals, helped Michelle and I get situated as we prepared our table. Gary and his staff of volunteers put up Celestron posters throughout the mall, which to our delight, gave our company much recognition. Setup was fast an efficient, as we displayed our IYA FirstScope, Handheld Digital Microscope, SkyScout, FirstScope sell sheets and catalogs. Michelle also brought along 500 orange Celestron Frisbees, pens, beanies, caps, pop rocks and IYA posters to hand out to our visitors. We displayed our raffle prize telescopes including the IYA FirstScope, AstroMaster 70 AZ and a NexStar 4 SE and brought along a NexStar 130 SLT to display as well. At 10 AM, the opening ceremonies began with local radio disc jockey, "DC in the Morning" giving the welcoming speech, which was followed by performances from local school children, including my cousin's son's class. The crowds began to fill the mall as everyone began to check out the nearly 50 exhibitors and watch the performances. The Mayor of Hilo, Billy Kenoi, showed up a bit late, but all was forgiven as he delivered his opening message and gave a proclamation for AstroDay. At the same time, the Celestron table was swamped by people who were filling out raffle prize tickets for a chance to win one of many prizes we had donated. As the hours passed, scheduled performers took to the stage and entertained the audience with music, song and dance. Hawaiian performers included Keoki Kahumoku, Sonny Lim, Brittni Paiua, John Keawe and Russel Mauga and friends. Man, what a talented group of musicians. It's so awesome to be in Hawaii! As the crowds gathered around our table, Michelle and I gave a demo on the products we had on display. It was great to hear all of the interesting questions about telescopes from all the people, especially from the children. Our IYA FirstScope was an exceptional crowd favorite with its compact size, outstanding optics and unique tribute display on the outside of the optical tube of the men and women who made a significant impact in the world of astronomy and science. Children got a big kick out of looking out across the mall and watching people walk by through the telescope. Our Handheld Digital Microscope was also a crowd favorite which everyone found fascinating to explore up-close the items which were laid out on the table. "Cool!" was definitely the theme of the day.
Just after 2 PM, the Raffle Drawing commenced, and I joined "DC in the Morning" on stage to announce the winners. The crowd was really pumped up, and I did my best to keep them on the edge of their seats. We began by raffling off a couple of "Eyes on the Skies" DVDs, followed by a couple of "Eyes of the Skies" books which also included the DVDs. Finally it was time to raffle off the telescopes and the crowd began to cheer loudly. The winners had to be present in order to win. "DC" drew the winning tickets as I announced the names. To our surprise, a lot of the names we called did not respond, so we kept on drawing tickets until one by one, the winners stepped forward. The grand prize, a NexStar 4 SE, was also not initially claimed, so the upbeat crowd urged me to draw again, which I happily obliged. Finally, a shy, young lady stepped forward as the crowd moaned in disappointment that they didn't have the winning ticket. Better luck next year. Who knows what cool giveaways and raffle prizes will be in store for next year? As the event began to draw to a close, nearly all of our giveaways were gone. No matter where you looked, someone was either carrying or wearing our Orange Frisbees. 500 in all were given away and people were still asking for them up to the end. To see photos from AstroDay, check this link: http://astroday.net/Hilites.html
At the conclusion of AstroDay, Michelle decided to donate our display NexStar 130 SLT to teacher, Alicia Hui, who was recognized earlier in the day as the winner of the 2009 Big Island Toyota Excellence in Teaching Award. Alicia received the award for her selfless dedication and commitment towards her student's education. Although she had already left the mall, Gary promised to surprise her yet again and present the telescope to her on Celestron's behalf. As an added gesture, Michelle also presented Gary with an extra IYA FirstScope we had brought along. It was a small token of our appreciation for all of his tireless efforts to promote astronomy and science to the people of Hawaii at AstroDay and all the years of his commitment towards Public Outreach. AstroDay would not be complete without a star party, so later that night, my cousin Scott, took us to the Visitor Information Station at the 9300 foot level on Mauna Kea to do some stargazing. A Celestron C14 and CPC 800 were set up, along with a 24" Dob and various other scopes around the parking lot. We marveled at seeing Polaris and the Southern Cross together at the same time. Views of Omega Centauri, Jewel Box cluster, Eta Carina nebula, Eskimo nebula and Saturn were simply amazing, even though a bright Moon was visible that night. What a great way to end our Hawaiian AstroDay adventure. Special mahalos to AstroDay Founder, Gary Fujihara, Assistant AstroDay Organizer, Kenyan Beals and all the staff and volunteers for welcoming and taking good care of us. To all the raffle prize winners, enjoy and keep looking up! Until next AstroDay! Aloha.
Wow.. it's been a long time, but not uneventful to say the least,,, we have been hit with record rainfall and flooding even I, had 6" of water in my basement...
but the sun and stars returned..however to my dismay I find my typical targets (large area targets) no longer in the sky..spring has sprung and galaxy season is upon us again..
usually I dread this season since my imaging setup is not geared for the tight fields of view that most galaxies have...and since my light pollution level is unforgiving the need to use broadband nebula filters creates a added layer of complexity to galaxy imaging
These filters block light.. and when you image galaxies you want every fleeting photon you can snag...
Lately, I have been imaging widefeild with the canon 350D on my 80MM FD.. for vistas like gamma cygni, north american nebula this scope/camera combination is suited perfectly.
but the canon camera has a large cmos chip and when used with my C8 at f/10 or f/6.3 the field of view is still not tight enough...
the galaxies of plenty need a tighter field of view, kind of like the field of view of my guide camera the dsi pro II,
well here is the problem,, i got a fairly sensitive black and white camera that would get me the image scale suited for these little buggers...but i would not have a camera to guide with and i hate switching cameras since I have to recreate flats...etc...
here is my dilemma ...to Guide or Not to Guide...
In the past I would never even attempt this..but that was before i put my scope on a pier...
my scope really never had "great" polar alignment, i always managed to get close enough and use good autoguiding
but I want to use my guider to image,,, hmmmm
1st requirement to "no guiding" is PERFECT polar alignment.. this will eliminate all the DEC drift out of your scope
In the past, I always used the Celestron polar alignment in the nextstar controller this allows you to roughly align,
this works well but is not perfect ...I need PERFECT
I needed to drift align..what is drift aligning ? you ask.... well it's a method of polar alignment in which you monitor the movement of stars positioned at different locations in the sky with inaccurate polar alignment stars tend to drift up and down in the field of view, by monitoring this drift and making fine adjustments to the mount, you can dial out the drift and put the scope in perfect polar alignment, I would get more into details but you can learn Drift Alignment with a quick google "drift alignment" there are many sites that describe this better than I...:)
the 2nd requirement for "no guiding" a good PEC training. this way you can offset the known worm gear error in almost every mount on the planet... to get my mount "trained" as best as possible i decided to use Celestron's own PEC training utility which records training runs and averages them for a final PEC training profile i then uploaded to my mount... (how many reading this is saying .. Huh???)...
PEC is Period Error Correction this is a feature in Celstron's scopes which allow you to record guiding corrections that will repair the error your mount has when tracking in right accession, there is a round gear with teeth like a bike's sprocket, this gets turned but a small gear that turns slowly, as it turns it pulls the large sprocket in RA, the error is caused by imperfections in this gear as it pulls along, and most mounts have this problem, getting a good number of training passes at guiding different locations in the sky allows you to combine guiding runs for a pretty accurate autoguide in RA which is stored in the mount and played back on demand using no guide camera
I spent a few nights working on both these problems I decided to give it a go with no guiding..
Visit my photo gallery for the results everything black and white and the latest two new images from my widefield setup was captured without using my guider..
the standard I use now is 60 sec exposures with the DSI, I can go longer but i only capture more of the lightpollution skyglow
and I work to get 60+ subs of any one target
with any stack, you usually throw away a few subs, but on some of these images I did not..so a total of 60 frames all used :)
so now I image galaxies something I never enjoyed until now..
now I need a filter wheel ;)
cheers John
Tags: galaxies
Whoopee! My CPC1100 long-awaited came back, finish to repairing interval of eight months at last after. I'm very happy.
I spent a wonderful night with her last night. She guided me to the heavenly bodies which I hope to watch accurately. The sky condition was not too well. Pale galaxies didn't show clearly. But I enjoyed M51, M104, NGC4565 and so on. However globular cluster, M3 astoished me that it showed like the big ball of innumberable silver sand. I could discriminate a lot of star one by one on the ball. Like this our reunion passed without notice.
The sketches with CPC1100
Below is my sketches, M51 in Canes Venatici, NGC4565 in Coma Borealis and M3 in Canes Venatici.
The views in my aria.
June, it's the turn of the season to summer from spring just now in Japan. Paddy fields finished rice planting spread out around my aria. Green rice shoot keep ranks in water. This time, water is necessary for the growth of rice. There are always the reservoirs up them. Water is running down through ditches trenched skillfully. The sound of water sound "choro-choro" gently.
The Divine
People have thought the Divines govern the growth of crops, rain, sunshine, and the luxuriance. So there are the place enshrined them in every village. They are consecrate, prayed, and appreciated when the harvest finish. This heritage has come down since few thousand years. I hope that the inheritance will take over with nature, though the developments have advanced in the countryside too and destroyed beutifull nature.
Tags: sketch
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| CPC1100 and me |
I have enjoyed using CPC1100 to look at stars with my naked eye. ：） After all I have not owned astronomical camera. So I come up with using "Visual camera". This is the simple way. I look at the astronomy object and sketch it with penile. That's all. I may not pencil an illusion like an astronomy photograph; after all, I try to see too careful. It is my promise to be as modest as possible I can.
This is the sketch of M57 in Lyra wiht CPC1100 and Vixen NLV 12mm eyepiece, 233-power "Aug 22, 2009". Ring showed white very clearly. The inside of the doughnut was whitish. The master of Ring, which is the centered star, not showed. The one-sided edge of Ring opened like a tulip bud.
The most distant galaxy I had seen yet is NGC 2815 in Hydra. It is said about 125,000,000 light-years and magnitude 11.9, showed extremely pale and elliptic. Then I unconsciously shouted "W,Wow!! It's is G,Great!" The exclamation reverberated around the quiet of the nigh over the clear sky. I noticed neighbors might wake up. Hereafter I must have nothing to say for myself under the night sky.
Then CPC1100 has been impressive for me. I want the high Cooling CCD camera. So I'm going to wark in earnest and save up for to buy it, do housework devotedly, as a result give my wife her OK. My Visual Camera will continued to move happily until "OK".
Tags: cpc1100
3-17-2009
This has to be the one of the longest period of bad weather I've delt with for a year, 2 weeks with only 2 nights worth opening the observatory, and unfortuantly one of these nights I had a problem with my C8, :( tonight is my 1st chance to image with everything in place, still using the 80MM for imaging scope I decided to attack IC2177 the Seagull Nebula, this target is one of those southern tree dodgeing targets, I was suprised to get 24x360second sub frames, and seeing was good :)
Camera Canon 350D w/ir/uv modifiation
Filter 2" celestron sct lpr filter
Imaging Scope - William Optic 80MM w/.8 focal reducer, inline with 7.5MM baader spacer
Guide camera -DSI II
Imaging Software -Nebulosity v2.1
Guide Software - PHD 1sec subs
Mount - Celestron CGE
Calibration frames 30x360 dark 30x .3ms sky flats
Light Frames 24x360sec temp 32 f 8:00 pm edt - 12am edt 12-17-2009
Stacked with Deep Sky Stacker
Processed with PhotoshopCS3 and the Noel carboni AstroTools
- Target 2 for this evening M101 Pinwheel Widefeild -
Posting to Follow
CS
John
Astronight observatory
Riding high on the heels of another successful elementary school star party two nights earlier, Celestron was once again on the school star party trail. Next stop, Horace Mann Elementary School, located in the city of Anaheim. Horace Mann is a year round, public, K-6 school with an enrollment of approximately 1370 students. Teacher Jana Lupica, also known as "Miss Lupica" to her students and daughter of Celestron president and CEO, Joe Lupica, had earlier requested if Celestron would be able to conduct a star party at her school. At first, we encountered several conflicts with other events already scheduled in our Community Relations calendar. However, when Friday, March 26, 2010 became available, we quickly set the date and the star party was on! On this evening, a waxing gibbous Moon would be visible, along with several bright planets. Because this school is located more inland from the coast, chances for clear weather remained very high.
Celestron sent out a team of personnel representing different departments within the organization. Representatives included: Marketing Manager, Michelle Meskill; Graphic Artist, Christy Ziemer; Firmware Engineer, Derik DeVecchio; Repair Department Supervisor, Danny Fuentes; Technical Support Representative, Tyler Michaelis; and myself, Kevin Kawai, Community Relations Coordinator. President Lupica and his wife, Carole, were also present and ready to take part in the festivities. We arrived on campus in the late afternoon and were greeted by Principal Hallman and Miss Lupica. The weather forecast called for clear skies, and as we glanced upwards, saw only bright blue skies with not a single cloud in sight. We knew it was looking to be a very special star party night. Our telescopes and tables were set up in the playing field to avoid as much stray lights as possible. Meanwhile, the school staff hooked up a PA system, and the fundraising committee prepared pizzas, snacks and drinks for sale.
It wasn't before long when excited students and parents began converging upon us. For many people, this would be their first ever star party, and the crowds just couldn't wait to view the Moon, even before we could assemble the telescopes onto the tripods! In an instant, the lines stretched out as far as the eye could see - beyond the playing field and onto the playground. The kids were just so enthusiastic and well behaved. They asked us a lot of interesting questions. Some of the more interesting questions and comments we heard included: "How does this thing (telescope) see so far away?" and "I think I can see Jesus!" Yes, leave it to the kids for coming up with some truly enlightening remarks.
As the clock ticked away, it was time for me to conduct my presentation on the Solar System objects that would be visible that evening. My talk also focused on what exactly is a telescope, and what are the different types of telescope optical systems. I purposely made my presentation very interactive, and I encouraged the kids to ask questions to their heart's content. As I wrapped up my presentation, I noticed the planet Venus becoming visible against the western twilight sky and immediately pointed out the planet. One by one, the kids and their parents excitedly echoed in unison "There it is!" "I can see it!" How exciting it was.
With 7 telescopes in operation and 2 SkyScouts in use, this star party was the biggest I could remember in recent memory. We estimated 500 to 600 people (families) were in attendance. Michelle and Christy busily worked the Celestron table and passed out astronomy pamphlets and glow rings, while keeping the FirstScopes aimed at the Moon. Before long, the field quickly became illuminated with "floating orange rings" moving about. Each telescope focused in on a variety of different celestial objects including the Moon, Mars, Saturn and the Orion Nebula. The views literally blew away the crowds, including Principal Hallman, as he gazed at the planet Saturn and saw its rings.
Just before the conclusion of the star party, a raffle prize drawing took place with President Lupica doing the honors of choosing the winning tickets, while daughter, Jana (Miss Lupica), took on the role as MC. Raffle prizes included an Anniversary FirstScope and a 60LCM telescope. Congratulations to all the winners, and we hope you'll spend many nights under the stars while sharing the views with others with your new telescopes.
As the star party drew to an end, it was time to pack up and return home. Many people still couldn't get enough of the views and remained in line just to take one last look of the Moon and Saturn. Who could blame them? Celestron would like to say a big "Thank You" to Miss Lupica, Principal Hallman and faculty for inviting us to conduct this special star party for your school. We sure hope all the students discovered new and exciting worlds above them and will really take a liking towards astronomy and science. Who says science can't be fun? And thank you for saving some left over pizza slices for us. They sure were good, especially at the end of a very successful event. Until the next star party. Clear skies to us all!
Throughout 2009 stargazers the world over are celebrating the International Year of Astronomy, which marks 400 years since the great Italian scientist Galileo Galilei first turned a telescope to the sky. Galileo's discoveries launched a revolution in our understanding of the cosmos, one that's still going strong four centuries later.
While it's true that Galileo first glimpsed the Moon and stars with his little refractor in late 1609, he didn't make the discovery for which he is arguably most famous until January 1610. That was when, as he wrote in his book Sidereus Nuncius (The Starry Messenger), "Jupiter presented itself to me."
Viewing Jupiter at a magnification of 30×, Galileo was amazed to see it form a straight line with three stars, two on one side of the planet and one on the other. Night after night, the stars' positions right or left of Jupiter changed, and eventually he noticed a fourth star in the lineup too. Was Jupiter zigzagging against the starry background from one night to the next? That didn't make sense. Galileo soon realized that the planet's shifting companions aren't stars — they're moons!
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| On this manuscript page Galileo recounts the observations that led to his realization that Jupiter is circled by four moons at different distances from the planet |
It's hard to overstate the significance of this early telescopic finding. In 1610, nearly everyone thought that Earth was the center of all heavenly motion. Polish astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus had proposed 67 years earlier that the planets — including Earth — orbit the Sun, but most scientists thought this was ridiculous. After all, they reasoned, if Earth were whipping around the Sun, it would lose the Moon! Yet here was Galileo showing that a planet could orbit something — it didn't matter whether it was the Sun or the Earth — and hang onto its moons.
Galileo's discovery of what we now call Jupiter's Galilean satellites didn't prove that Earth goes around the Sun, but it definitely made the idea less outlandish. And sure enough, within a matter of decades, Copernicus's heliocentric, or Sun-centered, solar system achieved widespread acceptance — especially after the great English scientist Isaac Newton identified gravity as the force that keeps moons orbiting planets and planets orbiting the Sun. (Incidentally, Galileo's German contemporary, Johannes Kepler, figured out in 1609 that celestial orbits are ellipses, not circles. The International Year of Astronomy appropriately commemorates Kepler's contributions to science as well as Galileo's.)
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| Author Rick Fienberg captured this image of Jupiter and its four Galilean satellites on the evening of October 10th from his observatory in New Hampshire. From left to right, the moons are Callisto, Europa, Io, and (to the right of Jupiter) Ganymede. |
As it did to Galileo four centuries ago, Jupiter is presenting itself to us right now. Just go outside after dark, look low in the south if you live in the Northern Hemisphere or high in the north if you live in the Southern Hemisphere, and there it is: the brightest point of light in the sky these evenings. If you know the constellations in this part of the starry dome, you'll recognize that Jupiter shines in Capricornus, the Sea Goat. The planet is truly dazzling — much brighter than any star.
If you own any telescope at all, I think I can safely say it's more powerful than Galileo's. It surely has a bigger and better main lens or mirror, and it offers higher magnifications than 30×. This means you can easily see Jupiter's moons for yourself. In fact, you may be able to see them in ordinary binoculars.
As Galileo himself noticed, the moons orbit so fast that you can see their positions change appreciably over just a few hours. Io, the innermost of the Galilean satellites, orbits Jupiter in 1.8 days — that's a pretty short month! Then come Europa (3.6 days), Ganymede (7.2 days), and Callisto (16.7 days). Since they shift positions continuously, how can you tell which is which in the eyepiece? My favorite way is to call up Sky & Telescope's Jupiter's Moons applet. Any of the popular desktop-planetarium programs will identify the moons for you too.
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| The Cassini spacecraft captured this stunning view of Jupiter, with the Great Red Spot at lower right, as it flew by at a distance of 48 million miles on October 8, 2000, en route to Saturn. Courtesy NASA, JPL, and the University of Arizona. |
Sometimes you'll see a moon's inky black shadow drift across Jupiter's cloud tops, and sometimes you'll see a previously hidden moon pop out from behind the planet's disk or shadow. Planetarium software and the Jupiter's Moon applet can alert you to such events. I've been using telescopes for more than 40 years, and I still find myself watching Jupiter's moon-dance every chance I get.
In a modern backyard telescope, you can get a better view of Jupiter itself than Galileo ever did. He never mentioned the planet's cloud bands, which are visible in even a 2-inch-diameter telescope as dark and light stripes. And you can see the Great Red Spot, a gigantic cyclone that's been raging in the planet's southern hemisphere for several centuries. Keep in mind, though, that you can see the spot only when it's on the Earth-facing side of the planet, which is true for only a few hours at a time since Jupiter spins once every 9.8 hours. (Sky & Telescope has another applet you can use to find out when the Red Spot is crossing the center of Jupiter's disk.) And the spot's really not so great — it's a subtle reddish-brown oval, hardly worthy of its name. But it's still worth looking for.So get outside this season and spend some quality time with Jupiter. Think of it as your Galileo moment!
Tags: spotlight
It's been a long time since my last post as I've busy with my business and things have only just started settling down. I thought I'd just share this little nightmare I recently had with my primary mirror and hope that it may help other "noobs" falling into the same trap!
I recently purchased a new astronomy camera - an Imaging Source DMK41AF02.AS. Nice camera and much higher resolution than my old Philips SPC900NC (ToUcam III). First light for the new camera was not in ideal conditions (poor seeing and windy), but I was determined to try it out as we've had a long period of bad weather (which is still continuing!). The first images out of it showed a number of quite large dark spots, which I eventually narrowed down to being on either the primary or secondary mirror of the telescope. On inspection, with the mirrors still in place, I could see a few bits of black crud stuck to the primary.
Now, I've never had a primary mirror out before, and all the reading I've done on the subject suggests that this is not a good thing to do unless absolutely necessary! Gulp! Nervously, following the manufacturers instructions line by line, I removed the mirror. With the warning voices of those who have gone before me ringing in my ears, I soak the mirror in lukewarm water and detergent and proceed to VERY carefully clean it, rinse it and allow it to dry off.
Let the nightmares begin...
OK, so the mirror is now dry and I place it back in its cell and tighten down the rubber mounts that hold it in place. The cell is then placed back in the tube and secured. Collimation is done and all looks good. Whew! Job done, and no breakages! 
We're good to go, right? Not quite - I have to wait for a couple of days before we get any clear sky. Finally I get a break and take the scope, camera and laptop out to image Jupiter - hang on a minute, why can't I focus on Jupiter??? Must be "bad seeing". Let's try the Moon...OMG! Why does the Moon look like a big hairy white lemon?!!! There is a distinct "sinking" feeling in the pit of my stomach as thoughts of scratching the primary mirror surface during cleaning come to mind. Rechecked the collimation and it's still good. Spent the next half hour trying (unsuccessfully) to get good focus on the Moon. Oh dear...grasping at straws I think, "maybe the detergent left a streaky film on the mirror?".
...the nightmares continue...
The next day, the primary comes out again and, on close inspection, there are indeed streaks on the mirror (and the black spots of crud are still attached!). Yes! So, the mirror gets an even longer soak before cleaning again and this time is VERY thoroughly rinsed before drying off. Feeling somewhat relieved that I have "found the problem", 
the mirror is once again set into its cell and rubber mounts tightened down. The cell is placed back into the tube and recollimated and the weather waiting game starts again - this time I am even more anxious to see the result! A couple of days later I get a very small window of opportunity - it's still very overcast but the high wind is creating very brief glimpses of the Moon. It takes me several attempts between clouds to get as good a focus as I can. What the...?!!! Houston, we still have a problem! The Moon is still a big hairy white lemon!!! My heart is really racing now, and that sinking feeling in my stomach just dropped out of my trouser leg. 
...waking from the nightmare...
The following day, I emailed a few people for advice, and one of them sends me a document on "optical aberrations" and suggests I compare what I'm seeing with some of the photos in the document. Unfortunately, all of the photos are based on images of stars and I've only been looking at the Moon so far, so nothing seems to match up. I wait for another few days for a break in the clouds so I can get the scope out again and look at a star. Finally a small hole opens up and I can see a handfull of stars and quickly get the scope out to have a look. What I see doesn't match anything exactly, but has similarites to the "coma" and "astigmatism" images in the document. Progressively eliminating the potential causes that they list, I come to the conclusion that the mirror may be "pinched" - this apparently occurs when the mirror is too tight in its cell and causes the shape of the mirror to become distorted. Given that the mirror is about 1.5 inches thick, I doubt that this is the cause but proceed to remove the mirror from the tube (again!) and loosen off the rubber mounts and check that they are still tight enough to hold the mirror in place before placing it back in the tube and recollimating. It's several days again before the sky clears enough to check it out, and I'm a nervous wreck by the time it does finally clear. The Moon is up too, so I grab the scope and focus in...........
...the nightmare is over!!!
There it is! The Moon is back in all its big, bold and beautiful glory! Sharp as a tack! Jupiter and the Galilean moons look great too, and stars are once again pinpoint! It's late and my wife has gone to bed, but I whoop it up and dance a jig anyway! I'm exhausted from all the stress and worry that I've caused myself, and the cloud is returning anyway, so I pack up and head off to bed (I slept VERY well that night 
).
That was about a week ago and I haven't been able to get the scope out since and do some imaging. The only clear night we've had since then was the night I had to give a presentation on Jupiter to the local astronomical society that I joined recently. They had some viewing afterwards and we had a good look at Jupiter. By the time I got home it had clouded up again and it has remained that way ever since . Never mind, my time will come, and when it finally does it'll probably be an all-nighter!
The moral of the story? Well, I guess one moral could be "don't panic!". Another could be, if you're not confident in removing, cleaning and replacing a primary mirror - ASK FOR HELP from someone who knows! And if things start to go wrong, ask for advice sooner rather than later - you could save yourself a lot of stress!
Clear skies to all!
Mike
Hello Everyone,
I am happy to announce the release of yet another documentary style video. This one covers our flagship CGE Pro computerized German Equatorial mount.
Please enjoy and leave your feedback.
Tags: videos
Hello, everyone!
What a trip it was - 14 days, meeting many very nice people, both locals and foreigners, visiting Shanghai and 3 provinces, the Synta telescope factory at Suzhou, Purple Mt. Observatory at Nanjing.
And of course, the total solar eclipse!
That part of the adventure began with preparations here in the US, resulting in two complete photo rigs and approximately 20 lbs in photo gear. Everything was packed into one Jetpilot wheely bag of medium size plus a smallish Gregory Advent backpack. I had no troubles with the airline's size and weight restrictions.
At LAX, I met Bob, Mike and Alan, fellow eclipse chasers who were on the same China Eastern flight to Shanghai. We swapped a few stories and plans.
After a long 13-14 hour flight, I landed at Pudong airport, cashed a traveler's check into Yuan, managed to get my cell phone working and found a hotel. Then I had a hair-raising taxi ride from the airport to the People's Park area in Shanghai. Darting about and eventually ahead of all traffic, my 20-something Chinese driver drove like a bat out of hell, cutting from the right to the left and in between buses, trucks and traffic at about 80mph. He passed all others, including his fellow cabbies. I made it to Hotel 168 in one piece and had a good night's sleep.
The next day I walked towards the Bund and the river when lo and behold I spot Alan at a sidewalk cafe. Mike joins us and we all spend the rest of the day having (what else?) Coronas, great Chinese food and fun sightseeing in central Shanghai. That night I meet Australian videographer Anthony and his Chinese girlfriend Carrie. We share a very nice meal and plans at a restaurant off Nanjing Dong Lu. They plan to shoot high-def video of totality happening over iconic Shanghai structures. He's well-equipped, carrying several cameras and tracking mounts for the event.
Monday I move on to Jiaxing via train form the south bus station. My second taxi ride to the station was merely normal and the driver used a GPS to find his way. I check in to the Fortune Hotel, where I meet several other chasers, most notably Ron and his Chinese guide Jing.
My plan to go mobile for the eclipse has its first setback. The hotel cannot locate an available English speaking driver or cabbie for me.
The second setback is learning that even knowing the language has not helped. Jing has called every number in the hotel's directory of local guides and drivers and she had no success at lining up anyone either.
Tuesday the three of us try to see if we can move easily via bus and taxis to Moganshan, a high hill and national park maybe 70 miles from Jiaxing in the west and a possible eclipse watching site. It is a lovely park. Yet after 9-1/2 hours round trip, we realize that the possibilities of moving around Jiaxing on E-Day are remote. We are where we are and pray for good weather the next day. The forecast is for rain.
So far on the trip, the weather had been generally good in the morning, with haze and clouds developing in the afternoons. The first evening in Shanghai featured a magnificent red sunset, while Sunday in the city had been hot and sunny. Moganshan was sunny with some hazy clouds.
Wednesday dawns foggy. We meet at 645am and plan to scout out a couple of nearby local parks on foot for observing sites. We find a good spot quite nearby. At 8am, heading back to the hotel, the sun peeks out, encouraging us on our way. Alas, soon after we get to the hotel, rain begins, heavy and steady. All we can do is wait in the lobby, watching the torrent come down. As second contact nears, I take most of the gear back up to my tenth floor room and set up a tripod, photographing the city at intervals, watching it get dark and lights come on.
At totality, I run downstairs and outside. The rain has lightened and the excitement of the nightlike darkness in the midmorning has gripped everyone.
I run back upstairs. The sky lightens abruptly. Third contact. Ron calls, saying the sun is out. I look down at rooftops seeing people looking up with solar filters and sun goggles. Specular reflections glint off car windows.
I dash downstairs with one camera, zoom lens and solar filter. At the front door, people are peering at the sky, catching glimpses of the partial eclipse through clouds. I manage to get off two shots before the clouds close again for good and the rain starts again as a sprinkle.
I join Ron at the park. He is unluckier than I am and has not been able to get a shot of the sun. It refuses to reemerge and after 20 or so minutes, we adandon the attempt.
Later in the day I take the bus to Hangzhou. At the taxi stand, I spot a man with a solar eclipse t-shirt and ask: "Did you see it?" "Yes, just one minute of totality!" So, there were a few people in the region who got lucky and saw the bad weather eclipse after all.
I check into a very nice hotel right on West Lake and have a very good dinner of fish with lime grass. Ah, I'm in China and will have a good trip despite the eclipse washout.
But the day is not over. As I head back to the lake and hotel in evening darkness, my foot is caught by something behind a row of scooters. I'm hurt! I stumble on back to the hotel and ice up what I learn later is a broken foot.
The rest of the trip? That is many stories. In brief, I continue with my foot up Huangshan and loop back to Shanghai over the next eight days.
Stay tuned for more on this adventure!
Here are my photo results from Eclipse Day, July 22, 2009, Jiaxing.
Time sequence: Eclipse Nightfall, Jiaxing
Direct link for best view: http://www.shadowcasterpress.com/albums/TSE-China-2009/07222009_Jiaxing.gif
Bleak weather after first contact.
Direct link for best view: http://www.shadowcasterpress.com/albums/TSE-China-2009/1_9674.jpg
After third contact, the partial eclipse comes out to play.
Direct link for best view: http://www.shadowcasterpress.com/albums/TSE-China-2009/2_9702.jpg
Post-totality partial eclipse.
Direct link for best view:
http://www.shadowcasterpress.com/albums/TSE-China-2009/3_9704.jpg
Hello everyone!
So as I've been told since I have received my telescope (back in March 09) that I'll have the new telescope curse, so the weather won't be all that great for a week or two.. I was excited about the new telescope and how much I'll get outside with it and attempt to locate planets besides the moon. Well, I didn't think the curse was going to last THAT LONG. It's mid-june, and the weather honestly sucks. Every day, it is either cloudy, around 60 degrees, rainy, or thunder..lightning... and basically and honestly there are no good days to star gaze. And when it happens to be nice outside and warm, it is cloudy, very cloudy. Hence, there were no new pictures or updates.
Even my parents agree, that since ever I got the telescope the weather has been real bad, and that we should return the telescope so we get nice weather again! No worries..that was a joke, I'm not returning it but as you can see, at least I am not the only one who thinks and noticed the change in weather since ever I got the telescope. So you can definitely say that this "new telescope curse" is lasting just wayyyyy longer than expected! It is supposed to rain for the next week and half, is it ever gonna be nice out? I got out with my telescope about 2 weeks ago, just by luck because the weather was nice, but the moon wasn't out, and the planets were few degrees above horizon and all the trees and houses and light pollution was in my way! So I ended up looking at random stars (aka dots in my AstroMaster 130EQ) without finding anything. And when I was bringing the telescope back into my house, I noticed Jupiter (I had to go around my house to bring the telescope back inside), but it was already apart so I wasn't gonna put that thing back together. Poor Jupiter was blocked by trees, houses, etc from where I was.
So as of right now, my lovely AstroMaster 130EQ-MD is a nice decoration in my room
-EvaCZE
World largest?...nah!
Well, April 4th has been and gone, and the public turnout for our 100HA event in little old Levin, New Zealand totally exceeded our expectations! A world record it was not, but given our meagre population of around 20,000 a turnout of over 500 people was a dream come true for our small astronomy club. Before the event our club had a membership of 65, but by the end of the night we had added another 100 members to our group!
Leading up to the event we did quite a bit of promotion - handing out flyers at shopping malls and main streets, radio advertisements (free community event bulletins), library displays, etc. My company also donated a NZ$500 6" dobsonian telescope as a prize to try and attract as many punters as possible. I was lucky(?) enough to be sat at the registration desk on the night and taking entries for the telescope draw and signing up new members, and I was absolutely swamped! They just kept coming and coming all night (well, OK, until about 10pm anyway).
The weather, which had been quite uncooperative for the previous couple of weeks, could not have been better on the night - crystal clear skies and relatively warm, which I think contributed significantly to getting people out and about for us. Unfortunately, being stuck at the registration desk, I didn't get to see through a telescope all night! Ah well, such is life. At least I know that collectively we brought a lot of joy and amazement to a large number of people, and that, after all, is what it was all about.
We had 2 main telescopes set up and gave everyone the opportunity to see Saturn through them and then register for the prize draw. After that they were free to wander amongst the 10 or so other telescopes that were viewing other interesting objects. Lots of oohs and ahhs could be heard all night. There was also an amateur astronomer giving talks indoors and an information table where the public could ask questions and access information on astronomy.
Since then, I have immensely enjoyed reading about and seeing photos/videos of all the events around New Zealand and the rest of the world. It has been an amazing experience, and I congratulate all of you who participated in this truly global event. For those who are interested, I have attached a short video of our event below. My apologies for the quality - the intro was shot using a handheld camera (a bit shaky!) and the remainder was shot from a static tripod (I didn't have any free time to move the camera around!). Unfortunately, I also forgot to switch the camera over to "night" mode, so the footage is rather dark, but you can see how many people were there by the shadows moving against the background! Hope you enjoy.
Cheers,
Mike
The latest accessory in the DarkMatters DIY FirstScope line: The Collapsible Dew Shield!
Yes, it's necessary to have one - at least in coastal California. The foot-long tube will dew up after a couple of hours in the marine environment of Seal Beach, Point Vicente, etc. It happened at the very end of Galilean Nights back in October.
So, to prevent that from happening again, I went to Michael's craft store and spent a buck for the 12x36 sheet foam. It's closed cell and about 3/32" thick, cuts easily and is available in colors including flat black. (I've used it before with other materials to make a tube cap for an 8" SCT - good stuff!)
OK, measure the tube diameter, multiply by 3.141259, add fudge for overlap.
Roll your own! And use another favorite material, Weldwood rubber contact cement. Apply, allow tackiness (about 2-3 minutes), bond, and cure overnight.
It goes on the tube and extends about 5" out. I didn't want to make it longer because then it vignettes the light to the scope.
Fashionistas take note: color-coordinated.
And now for the coolest part - it flattens out and goes right into the camera bag I use to carry the FirstScope!
To use it, I just pull it out and work it a bit to get it back into round and voila: dew-free observing!
I still have left-over foam that I'll use this weekend for a C-5 solar filter sleeve.
Keep looking up!
Dark "McGyver" Matters
As many astronomers know, first light is one of the most important events of any new telescope. It allows you to look at a well known object and get a idea of how good your telescope is going to be. For this celebrated event, I chose M 31, often referred to as the "Great Andromeda Nebula".
Now, before I go any further, I need to tell you about the sky conditions here in Harleysville, PA. Lots of sky glow from light pollution. On a scale of 1 to 5, 5 being the worst, my location rates a 3. The faintest visible star is magnitude 4.5 when transparency is at it's best. On this night transparency was just that but seeing was just moderate and M 31 is at the zenith. I dropped in my 20 mm Plõssl which gives me x37.5. I got a clear, crisp view with pinpoint star images. The brightest portion of M 31 is well defined and I can see M 110 at the edge of the eyepiece. I increased the power to x53.5 with my 14 mm eyepiece. This gave me the best view. The galaxies central region is stunning and with averted vision I can detect a dark lane across the width of the eyepiece.
Next up, the Double Cluster h and Chi Perseus (NGC 869 & NGC 884). For this I dropped in the 25 mm Plössl that was supplied with the Celestron Omni XLT 150R. I don't know much about this eyepiece except that it gives me x30. The entire Double Cluster is visible in the eyepiece. What a sight!. The star images are pinpoint sharp, clear to the edge of the FOV. The Double Cluster has always been one of my favorite deep sky objects.
Out-of-the-box, the Celestron Omni XLT 150R is easy to assemble, setup and use. Take your time to balance this instrument. A little trial and error is all it takes. This telescope offers clear, crisp views and is a good value for the money. I'd recommend the Celestron Omni XLT 150R to any beginner or intermediate level amateur astronomer.
Clear Skies,
90mm
Just a few miles south down Interstate 110 from Celestron headquarters in the port city of San Pedro, California, resides the Toberman Neighborhood Center. This multi-purpose, non-profit community center provides various social services to nearly 14,000 inner-city individuals and families in need of assistance. The center's mission is to help those to "get back on their feet" and reclaim their lives by providing tools and resources through counseling, teaching and training. This includes working with children, teens, families, adults and senior citizens within the community.
On Monday, October 26, 2009, the Toberman Neighborhood Center hosted the "Toberman Meets the Man on the Moon" event which Celestron Marketing Coordinator, Yasmine Rios; Technical Support Representative, Derek "DarkMatters" Wallentinsen and I attended. The evening began with an official presentation by Celesron of a NexStar 102 SLT to the Toberman Neighborhood Center. Robert Brandin, who helped organize the event, served as the Master of Ceremonies. Speeches were given by the President and CEO of the Toberman Neighborhood Center, Gloria Lockhart and Consultant, Fund Developer, Kristy Day. Robert introduced Yasmine to the audience, and she thanked the Toberman Neighborhood Center for their years of services to the community. Yasmine then spoke words of inspiration to all the children in the audience as they sat and listened attentively. I spoke next and told my personal story of how I was once given the opportunity to look through someone's telescope when I was their young age, and how it inspired me to have a lifelong interest in astronomy and telescopes. I made sure to let the children know that their generation will be our future scientists, astronomers, teachers or even astronauts as long as they follow their dreams and keep studying hard. They could become anything they want to be. The children were given a few minutes to pick my brain and ask me various astronomy related questions. I was quite amazed at the types of space related questions these 5 to 7 year olds were coming up with. The interest level about space was definitely there! With time being limited, the hosts wrapped up the question and answer session and moved everyone outside. The much anticipated telescope viewing was ready to begin.
The hosts laid out the ground rules such as no running, no touching the scopes, etc. Yasmine passed out lighted glow rings that really got the children excited, including some of the adults. Our Technical Support Representative, Derek "DarkMatters" Wallentinsen was already outside waiting with a vast array of telescopes, including his NexStar 5, Onyx 80, as well as my NexStar 6 SE. Joe Hellum, the Toberman's resident astronomer and math tutor, set up the new NexStar 102 SLT. With all the telescopes already aligned and aimed at the Moon or Jupiter, the children formed lines and began taking in the views. How exciting it was to hear the kids counting how many moons they could see around Jupiter and scanning in amazement over the lunar terrain. You know what? That's something we just never get tired of hearing. The excitement of people, both young and old alike, enjoying and taking in the views of the night sky never gets old. If we inspired and sparked just one child's interest that evening to think astronomy and science is cool, then it was all worth it. We're confident many people discovered and experienced something new. When a mother and her young son took their first glimpses of Jupiter, I heard the little boy say "when I grow up, I want to be an astronaut." I said to myself "you know something, he may just become one." We wish the Toberman Neighborhood Center many clear nights using their new telescope to explore and open up new worlds to all the members of your center. When you're ready to host another star party, we'll be back.
Thursday 9th October, 2009, 3.00am. In just 90 minutes time, NASA was to crash a lunar probe LCROSS into a permanently shadowed crater (Cabeous) at the Lunar South Pole. Actually the upper stage of a Centaur rocket would hit the moon first at 6km per second followed 4 minutes later by the LCROSS probe itself. LCROSS was to fly through the plume sent up by the first impact and measure hopefully, water vapour.
The impact time and site were carefully chosen to allow all the big scopes - The Keck - CFH - Palomar - Hale - etc, in the West of N.America to focus on The Moon with a barage of imagers, spectrum analysers and the like in the hope of securing both scientific proof of water on The Moon and to provide a spectacle for the public. The Result? Well the Jury is still out on that one, but it was great to know that we were watching the Lunar South Pole at the same time as most of the major observatories in Western N.America! My alarm went off at 3.00am and I immediately checked the sky conditions. The sky was 80% cloud covered. But The Moon was in the clear sector. I made some breakfast and checked again at 3.30am. The sky was clearing fast so it was a green light to set-up the scope in the backyard. I gave my wife Debra the clear sky report at 3.45am. Outside at 4.00am I began aligning the ASGT Mount - I didn't want the scope to drift too much when I was videoing the Moon at high power. I looked up and there was now 80% cloud cover again. The sky conditions were changing so rapidly it was hard to keep up. There was some low fast moving cloud racing across the face of The Moon as we aimed our scopes skyward. At the last minute I realised the hand controller for the C8-ASGT was missing from its case! My cell phone showed 4.25am and I raced into the house trying to figure how the HC could be missing? Finally I found it in my backpack *&^% I had taken it to London Drugs to look for an RS232 Cable to connect to the PC. I dashed back to the scope, plugged in and did a 'Quick Align'. My cell phone showed 4.29am - time was evaporating - as I slotted in a 7.5mm E.P. with my Pentax Optio E30 (pocket digital) attached. I zeroed in on the South Polar Region at 271x but couldn't quite decide what crater was cabeous ... The video was running as I again glanced at my cell phone and saw 4.32am. The Impact had happened! I stared at the 3" screeen on the back of the camera as the video continued to record. There was no sign of a plume, no flash or sign of any kind of movement. I had seen SMART-1 hit The Moon a couple of years ago - it was the briefest fleck of light - so I expected something more ... I continued to video the impact area hoping a plume might develop but I later learned even the 200 inch Hale Telescope saw nothing! Finally at around 4.45am I slewed away from The Moon - Orion was calling ... I split The Trapezium for the first time with a C8. It was the biggest view of The Trapezium I've had and I had to remind myself the cloud in the FOV was Hydrogen and not the low thin cloud in the sky above me. I slewed over to Mars and found a small squidgy yellow blob. I went back to The Moon and shot some video of mountains and craters near the terminator. I Looked up once more at The Moon around 5.45am and thought to myself, we came, we saw, errr, nothing! But, if a plume had developed, if it had been front page headlines the next day, how mad would we have been if we had missed it? I was glad to be pointing my scope along with the Hale, The Keck, The Canada/France/Hawaii Telescope at The Moon!
My family did "Tsukimi" last night. We arranged "Tsukimi dango" and pampas grass on a table and keep the east window open. How do I explain "Tsukimi" of Japanese custom?. Well, well...Full moon last night is just Harvest moon. We've done "Tsukimi" at the night every year. "Tsukimi" spells "月見" in Chinese characters. "月(tsuki)" means "Moon". "見(mi)" means "Look". So "Tsukimi" is the happy custom to look at moon one time in a year. "Tsukimi dango" is Japanese cake. It is a rice dumpling and spherical form like full moon. The taste is the faintly sweet.
"It is beautiful full moon, isn't it?"
"Yes, it is."
"Let's eat dango early. I am very hungry."
After Tsukimi, I went out with Celestron NexStar 102 SLT telescope. The moon vividly showed through a rift in the clouds sometimes. I directed the telescope to the full moon and shot it by my simple camera of cellular phone looked into a 40mm eyepiece directly. Then I e-mailed the photo my older daughter who is at university and lives alone in Nara.
Meanwhile she sent a photo me. It was a sight of a classic and magnificent Tsukimi festival the ancient capital.
I realized that my family always has been connected each other under the sky. Full moon shed over the shrine near my house.
A short note about the mishaps that have befallen my trusty Canon 300D (Rebel). I had the camera at prime focus on my Celestron Omni 150 XTL. I'd just taken some nice shots of Orion. I turned the camera to remove it from the T-Ring and for some reason it would not come undone. It turned O.K. but just would not release. I carefully tried about four times to remove it - but no deal. So I let go and Wham! the Canon dropped about 4 feet onto concrete!!! I thought the Canon was toast, but I picked it up to discover only the small settings window on the back was cracked. Murphy's law - the camera would not come lose but the moment I let it go - hey presto instant release!!! To stop Your camera doing the same, hook the strap around some part of the scope. Simple enough, whish I'd thought of it earlier
The second near disaster was with a 250mm IS lens attached. I thought I'd save some extra baggage by putting the camera with lens attached into my sturdy backpack instead of bringing the camera bag. But as I got into the car the pack pack bumped off the centre console. I thought nothing of it. But later I tried to take some pictures and the camera would not operate. I examined the camera to discover an alarming gap between the camera and lens. Yikes ... I took off the lens to discover it had nearly been ripped of its mounting ring. The ring was plastic and had broken away from the securing screw revealing some wiring and other lens internals. It didn't look good for my $350 lens, but I got out my small screwdriver set and managed to take out the retaining screw and force the warped ring to seat back into place. I retightened the screw and attached the lens to the camera and it worked - whew!! Lesson two - always use a camera bag (a well padded one), instead of your back pack, jacket pocket, floor of the car, glove box (I'm guilty of all of these).
Well the camera is looking a little beat up now, but its 8 years old, still works perfectly and still takes great deep sky shots. This would be good grounds for a new Canon T1i and I'll put that case to the wife soon I'm sure. But for now just being a little bit more careful with the old battle torn Canon!
Tags: cameras
CPC1100 what is my most favorite telescope has been taken hospital for electronic trouble three weeks ago. I had been lonely. "Night sky is calling me" I decided to buy smaller and lower a telescope. I debated which I shall select. I thought "CPC1100 is the Queen. I treat her with great care when she starts to act under the night sky. Then I want a great guy to be with!" As a result I chose Celestron NexStar 102 SLT after my mind.
He started a full-dress astronomy observing under the clear starry skies last night.Below are my sketches with NexStar 102 SLT aperture is 102mm.
M13 in Hercules, Globular Cluster. by NexStar 102 SLT with 9mm eyepiece.
The central part was very bright and seemed like a ball crammed with minute sand. But I couldn't separate any stars.
M27 in Vulpecula,Dumbbell Nebula by NexStar 102 SLT with 12mm eyepiece.
It was difficult to draw the view rightly for me because an image I've seen photographs before hindered my optic nerve.At first sight it seemed spherical white cloud. I was looking at it out of the corner of my eye momentarily. Then arc showed on both sides of cloud and one side was larger than other side. It was true.
M29 in Cygnus, open cluster. by NexStar 102 SLT with 12mm eyepiece.
It was pretty. Quadrangle constituted four stars was impressive particularly.
M2 in Aquarius, globular cluster by NexStar 102 SLT with 9mm eyepiece.
The central part was bright. The periphery was pale widely. It couldn't be separated any stars.
M72 in the Aquarius, globular cluster by Celestron NexStar 102 SLT with 12mm eyepiece.
It was small and very pale.
The Delta-2 GPS satellite launch from 60 miles away in the Am hours of the 18th Aug, 6:30 am
It's here! It's here!! It's here!!!
Well, it's been a LONG time coming, but my XT10 Intelliscope (10" dob with computerized hand controller), the maker of which shall remain nameless here for fear of offending someone, has finally arrived! I ordered this back at the end of January 2009 to replace my PowerSeeker 127EQ after I attended my first ever star party and seeing what a huge difference aperture can make. Unfortunately I had to wait for the local dealer to amass a number of other orders so that they could ship them all at once, so the order wasn't actually placed to the US until March. Then, of course, they shipped them all by sea to save on shipping costs! I think I have driven my wife and kids loony while I've been waiting for it.
I've had to keep myself busy while I've been waiting, so I've made a Hartmann mask for it out of thin ply and a Denver Observers Chair as well, both from some DIY instructions I found on the 'net at http://www.iceinspace.com.au/projects.html. Here's a photo of the finished chair...
Folds up into a nice flat package for transporting too!
Anyways, back to the scope! It got its first light on Friday night after the kids helped me assemble the dob base (there was NO WAY I was letting them even touch the alt/az encoders though!). Unfortunately it was dark when we finished assembling and I had no idea how to align the finderscope with the telescope in the dark so decided to leave it until the next day to do that (I must be a bit of a sado-masochist to make myself wait another day with it all assembled and sitting in my lounge!). However, watching the weather report on TV at 10:30pm that night and seeing heavy rain warnings for about the next week soon changed my perspective and I dragged it outside to attempt the finderscope alignment in the dark! It took me about an hour and a half, but I finally got it aligned, only to find that the collimation was quite off as I couldn't achieve pinpoint focus on anything!
Grabbed the laser collimator (another new toy, which arrived with the scope) and the scope manual and set about doing the collimation...now let's see, the secondary mirror is not aligned properly and the manual says "Using a 2mm hex key", not "Using the supplied 2mm hex key"...aaarrrggghhh! A quick search of the supplied accessories reveals that the wording of the manual is correct - no hex key supplied! At this point I decide that Murphy's Law has been applied and grab a quick but slightly blurry view of Saturn and then the Tarantula Nebula before packing it up again and heading off to bed in disgust.
A clear head the next morning allows me to recall the el-cheapo toolkit locked up in the back shed that I bought about 20 years ago. A bit of searching resulted in me emerging from the depths of the shed with a whole bunch of different sized hex keys - one of which was a 2mm as required! Laser collimation was duly completed and now I just have to wait for the damn rain and thick cloud cover to GO AWAY!!!
But wait, there's more...
I recently ordered and received a Philips SPC900NC (ToUcam III) webcam, as I'd really like to try my hand at some astrophotography Obviously, with a non-motorized dob I never going to get images like John Buonomo, but at least I'll be able to hopefully take some halfway decent lunar and planetary images. Now I'm just waiting on the T-Mount and 2" adapter to connect the webcam to the telescope and I should be away laughing. Have also ordered the Celestron 2" eyepiece and filter kit too (not related to the desire to do astrophotography - they were just really nice eyepieces!). Most of these "extras" have been purchased under the radar...so don't tell my wife...please!!! 
Until next time - Clear Skies to all!
Regards, Mike
Wild 2: If You Were There On Jan. 2, 2004 NASA's Stardust spacecraft made a close flyby of comet Wild 2 (pronounced "Vilt-2"). Among the equipment the spacecraft carried on board was a navigation camera.that Comet Wild 2 is about 3.1 miles in diameter. This artist's concept depicts a view of Wild 2 that shows the faint jets emanating from the comet. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Jul 2010 23:00:00 -0500
Hello Everyone,
We are proud to release another installment in "The Path of Light" documentary mini-series.
Episode 2: "The Enlightenment" focuses on the importance of science education and the role astronomy plays in raising the next "Generation of Dreamers".
"The Path Of Light" is a documentary celebrating astronomy, telescope making and human ingenuity.
pardon my spelling and punctuation i first started out looking through a freinds dads telescope he passead away and the scope had just ben sitting ther collecting dust so i asked if i could play with it for a while and thankfully my bud said yes .i had always dreamed of looking through a good telescope and seeing the moon and mayb some planets here was my chance i think that this scope was a 6 inch reflector .well it ended up tht i just spent most of my time looking at the moon and a few stars because i did not no how to find the planets and then i dident even no that u could see most of them with your eye much less noing anything about nebula clusters or galaxys in other words i was pretty dumb when it cam to this stuff .but the first time i looked at the moon i was hooked on the deal beleve me it took me away.well it turned out that i did not get to spend but about a month with the scope but that was enough to set me off on a big adventure in the next few years to come.about three years had passed and i was always working never had to much time to think or act shall i say on the passion that was inside me i never could slow down enough to get in to this hobby. and then came a severe car wreck that changed my life forever my 9 year old son was killed in the wreck his name is tyler i miss him very much. but also i lost one of my legs above the knee and almost lost my other leg and life as well .needless to say that slowed me way down and i went through a rough time always feeling trapted in my room in a wheelchair this went on for a year and a half .well during this time i had ben watching a lot of tv a lot on the universe and things like that i loved it and that brought back the memory of looking through that first scope a few years back. well low and behold i have to make a trip to hobby lobby one day and passed down a isle that had a couple telescopes on it and i dident even think twice about i picked one up .the scope was a 70mm meade refractor the scope did have pretty views of the moon but that was all that i looked at and new what it was .i then new that u could see planets with the unaided eye i just did not no where they were .now as i was to find out later i had found jupiter with it but i did not no it at that time it just looked like a big star i thought because there was no detail and i could not make out any moons .i kep this scope for about a month and wanted to move on to something a little better so i went to toys are us and bought a three inch reflecter because i rememberd how good the one i had looked through before was.and went home and put it on the moon nand wow it was beautiful so i moved over to that big bright star that i thought was a star and every now and then i thought i could see a little twinkle right by it and and then thought that i might have found a planet i was very happy but still unsure .so i go jump on the computer to see if i could find some backyard pitures of planets to compare what i was seeing to what they had and boom the celestronimages.com website came up and i was very impressed with what i seeing .2010-04-182010-04-18 after looking at pitures i new that i had found jupiter and that really set me off. now i was ready for a celestron schmidt-cassegrain telescope .i had my eye on the se series and realized that i could only afford the 4 se and it was a maksutov-cassegrain and that was ok with me like i new the difference anyway right.
i leveld it up and aligned it and it worked first try so i looked at the moon just to see how close the tracking and slewing was and bam it was perfect .after looking at the moon for a minute i went to the hand control and selected jupiter and pushed the botton and it slewed over to it but it was just behind the trees so i was going to try some other planets just to find out thet were behind the trees also . so i slewed back to jupiter and was going to wait it out well i sat there for about 15 minutes and that was about all i could stand i picked up my scope and moved to a spot where i could see it .i did not align it this time because i could not wait anymore i had to no if this scope was the one that was going to allow me to see what i wanted to see so bad some detail on a planet . well when i put my eye to the eyepiece oh my god i almost fell out of my wheelchair i could not beleve what i was seeing .the cloudbelts on jupiter and 4 moons i woke my whole famely up 3 differnt households to come share that moment with me it was priceless.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkyKl28N_Ug mars http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vx4jc7h2aRU |
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As we were moving towards the Thanksgiving holiday, one event remained on our calendar for the month of November - the Armijo's Family Daycare Star Party. Lead Repair Technician, Hector Antuna, who can often be seen representing Celestron at star party and dealer events throughout the southland, organized this special star party for his 4 year old son, Geovanni and his classmates. Would sharing the night sky through telescopes be a bit too much for such young children at this early age? Not a chance! For at least a month before the star party took place, the children, ages 4 to 5 years, with the guidance of their teachers, Carmen and Luis Armijo, prepared for the big night by learning astronomy words and conducting their own space related art projects. As the event grew closer and closer, Carmen explained that the children's excitement really began to unfold, as they were so anxious to look through telescopes to view some of the very same solar system objects which they have been learning about.
Before long, the night of the big star party finally arrived. With the assistance of Repair and Returns Warehouse Supervisor, Daniel Fuentes; Repair Technician/Returns Warehouse Clerk, Flavio Dominguez; Returns Warehouse Clerk, Salvador Roldan; and myself, the daycare's playground was transformed into a field of telescopes ready to open up new and exciting worlds for all those in attendance. Before the star party began, the daycare treated us all to a pre-Thanksgiving dinner, complete with pumpkin pie, turkey and all the trimmings. There was even pepperoni pizza on the menu too! A big "Welcome Celestron" sign greeted us, along with some of the children's celestial art works, drawings and photographs. We were extremely humbled by the warm greeting we received and touched by all the hard work and efforts the children made with their special astronomy projects. It was simply awesome.
After dinner, Carmen gathered the children together, and they sang a couple of astronomy related songs for everyone, including "twinkle twinkle little star." Next, each child stepped forward and given the microphone, so they could read aloud verses from their astronomy projects. This provided an early but valuable lesson to teach each child to not be afraid of being in the spotlight. It was also a great opportunity to show everyone how much they've been progressing with their reading skills. It was truly heartwarming to witness the children's smiling faces, as the audience and especially their parents, cheered in approval. "Yes, you can do it, and don't give up," I said out loud. The star party was then ready to begin and everyone went outside eager to see what's up in the night sky. In fact, the parents seemed just as excited as their children to view celestial objects through the telescopes for the very first time too!
The Celestron team brought along several computerized telescopes, including a SkyScout. In addition, Frisbees, glow rings and t-shirts were brought along as gifts, but Hector felt it would be best to present these items to the children until after the star party concluded, so they wouldn't be too distracted. Good idea. The children eagerly lined up in rows and were on their best behavior, as one by one, they stepped forward and peered into the eyepieces and saw their first ever views of the Moon, Jupiter and the colorful double star, Albireo. Many came up with some really interesting questions such as "Is there people living there?" "How far away is that?" "What are those "stars" next to Jupiter?" and "Why are there so many holes on the Moon?" How intriguing considering these questions came from 4 to 5 year olds with a young mind full of curiosity. Parents were just as captivated, and were not afraid to display their emotions out in the open. I guess we can all relate to how we reacted during our first telescopic views of the Moon, for example. However, in my generation, most of us had our first celestial views through small aperture telescopes, and not through telescopes like the CPC series! As an added treat, the Space Shuttle Atlantis had just undocked from the International Space Station earlier in the day, and flew overhead like two "stars" side by side, right on schedule.
The star party lasted more than 3 hours, and throughout the evening, Danny, Hector, Flavio and Sal, commanded their telescopes to seek out other fascinating objects in the night sky such as the Double Cluster, the Pleiades, Orion Nebula, and double stars Castor and Polaris. One mother had to leave but soon returned with her husband in tow. She wanted him to experience the amazing views that she and her young daughters had seen earlier that evening. She said "I got addicted to the views and had to come back." Hector also brought out the SkyScout and wowed everyone even more by demonstrating how it's able to identify, locate celestial objects in the night sky. The audible narration proved to be a big hit as well.
Unlike most of the larger star parties that we participated at this year, this star party took place to a much smaller and younger audience; however, the impact was just as significant and everlasting as the others. I was proud of our Repair/Returns Warehouse team for volunteering their time to make this star party happen for the children, their parents and to the daycare staff. Sharing the night sky with everyone is always such an enjoyable experience. I wouldn't be surprised if most of these youngsters will always remember where they were when they saw the Moon, Jupiter and other wonders of the universe for the very first time. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
First, take a look at the hardware to be assembled:
This is the scope, an old dovetail bar (from a 4SE) plus two dive straps from Sports Chalet (6 dollars)
Next, adjust and buckle the straps around the tube. Initially you'll leave about a finger's width of looseness to slip in the bar.
Slip the bar in with the narrow side against the tube under one strap.
Now slip the bar into the dovetail clamp on your mount. Here it is an Astro-Tech Voyager. Tighten the dovetail clamp.
Pull the other strap over the other end of the bar and tighten the straps. OBSERVE!
A tripod works too, because the dovetail bar has 1/4x20 taps.
Here I use a quick release plate and screw it to the dovetail bar after slipping both sides of the strap over the bar.
Voila! A tripod-mounted FirstScope.
All this without drilling any holes. Same straps will hold to many EQ mounts, like the PowerSeekers.
Next FirstScope adventures: solar filter! rings!
L.E.D Astrophotography!!
The Walls i had are now Broken Threw!!
First... my nature shot of the Blog.. I've been after this little joker for months..
One Bat!!..my early eve,pre dawn Mosquito Hunter!!..(i'm have to find out if my G10 repair was done in a clean room, 8^/ )
The walls broken...
The Iron wall Computer issue is fixed..not totally resolved but at-least is functional for now
The Brick wall mount shakes an Atl-Az movement in frames is fixed...mounted my 8" se tube to a Celestron CGEM mount
This is my set-up currently (it changes weekly lately an will again in week with the "New Stuff" in route) The CGEM mount,8se tube,80mm guide scope an guide cam,piggy mounts on with red-dot laser on other side,Lap-top HC connected with a star chart program an to use the guide scope...the homemade dolly's been holding up great in the background.is bout time i bought real dew tubes...heh..i haven't yet but if i plan on exposures after 3am, Scope/Lens heaters are must..lol..(in my first blog i said the to ritzy)
This is cool to come out the house an look at in the backyard at night...Mass Machinery with L.E.D.'s all over them..
After buying a Brand New lap-top..my ole ones is a 1.89 meg upgraded/modified ,6 year ole ,$600 HP with XP..
My new ones a 2.1meg duel processor IBM with vista 64..I fired it up,transferred files,updated,secured it..
Went to upload the guide cams software an Access Denied!!!....i spend 5 hours hunting why not..I'm now fully Vista Proficient...lol ..this is what i got as the error..(please excuse the brand)
I was on a 64 bit machine...I contacted the "Vendor" of the cam, There's a patch coming out in Oct09'...8^/
I have purchased already a Computer-Less!! guide package..It sure better operate better then this package or this clown going for his bowling pins...hehehe
Now on to the Photo's ..Some are Finals.( all these where took in the last 2 days).. i won't try an expose again till next year these M27,M57,M13
This the M-13 Hercules Cluster...
The M-93 star cluster...
The M-15 Global Cluster
The Double Star Cluster..
The M-57 Ring Nebula
The M-27 Dumbell Nebula...
This the M-16 Eagle Nebula..(aka Pillars of Creation)This was my Favorite photo from Hubble Space Telescope i saw couple years back..Now I've Photo'd it Myself from my backyard with carried out equip. in Orlando,FL with just 8" glass over the Hubble's Huge Mirror
Here's the M-42 Orion nebula early in the am..Question...,the Star Glaze will be solved with lens heaters?? I was T1i,to adaptor screwed to 6.3 reducer on 8se tube with dew shield..i own a heat gun from my business, i've used it but can't find where this glare's coming from, it's only in the am hours, so as to be dew somewhere
It only creeps in on the edges with a reducer it seems..
Here's where i started out year an half ago,...Basic ole star's..but WOW if you have good camera equip..(i started out with cheap sony cyber-shot universally mounted,2.1 meg i think)
Rigel...
One my Favorite named stars to have to Nexremote software say...("Beatlejuice")
Betelgeuse
I'd shot Procyon to, but in editing it went to the wrong spot an got deleted...heh..opps..
It's now about 6am..The Dew's Insane, i'm getting over running round with blowdryer (heatgun)..There's clouds coming from the East..But i can't resist...I want Mars!!!
I go in the house, grab the G10 hook it up to the Contest 8se tube with lights on in the room... I put it on a 25x7mm baader zoom lens accompanied with Celestrons x2 barlow,I algin it all up, it being universaly mounted then unscrewed it from the 8se tube an headed back out..
I pull off the T1i/6.3 reducer an attach the "Monster Tower of Power" i call it an locate Mars...in short i went from Full Un-Zoom to full Zoom in 5 minutes or less...8^)
Mars...!!
(theres special Mars filters on the web i saw as well as a x5 barlow...hmmm..heh)
An that's it for this blog, the Walls are Broken, i can Expose All night...lol..Photo's People!!
In Route next's... Filter wheels,Filters,GPS unit,Power pack,Comp-less Guider...(Hint,Hint...I'm getting Mobile!!! No more light polluted shots)..last i guess will be the Scope/Lens heaters...Dew's Bad...Enjoy!! an Clear Sky's!!!
Bozo
http://www.youtube.com/user/YoudSayOmg
http://www.celestronimages.com/member.php?action=showprofile&user_id=2306
Well, I couldn't wait any longer. I ordered a Starshoot II Deep Space CCD Camera. With the mount that holds a digital camera up to the eyepiece is just not working for me. I wanted to hold off a while, but I got the bug again. I know eventually I'll have to get either a wedge or EQ mount for long exposures but for now I can just practice on the moon and planets until I can get it down.
Not really sure how running the telescope off of a laptop is going to work. I guess it's all in the practice, and a learning experience. I could definitely use some advice!
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16:48:32 2009-04-16
Well, this past month has been unforgiving, weather and other personal issues have kept the observatory closed...
last night was one of those nights,,, everything was perfect for astronomy,,,
I was able to get 3 images, M63 the Sunflower was the 1st taking this from dusk to midnight a total of 36x360 sec sub frames.
this was captured with the canon 350d and the C8 running at 6.3 or 1200MM, since the light pollution around here is so bad I used the CLS filter on this and got pretty good color results considering the conditions
next on the List was a Widefeild attempt with my Unmodifed Canon 350d with the 80MM and F.8 focal reducer, this image was taken from 12am-2:40am and I used the Celeston LPR filter, you should notice that the color correction is stronger in the red line... this is something of a aftereffect of this normally visual fiter,
To the Top is Messier 100 To the Right Is Messier 98 and at the Bottom the Spiral is Messier 99
last but not least is Messier 13 with the Canon 350D Modd and CLS fitler using theC8@6.3
this is the same camera used for the 63 image above. and this is a total of 15x360 from 2:40am-4:38 am
To View any of these lager just click on the images to load a larger view
Tonight looks like another Clear night, I will be attempting another group of galaxies...
so many to choose from....... mmmm which will it be
M101 ? M104 ? Leo Trio?
maybe all of these??
More to follow
Clear Skies
John
Well, it's been a while since my last post but things have been rather busy, especially in regards to planning our main "100 Hours of Astronomy" event here in Levin, New Zealand. If you haven't heard me say it before, Levin is a small town of around 20,000 people but the local astronomy club (Levin StarGazers) has had excellent results in attracting locals to our public star parties.
World Famous!
One of the public star parties that was held on Guy Fawkes last year was particularly successful and really helped put sleepy old Levin on the map. The photo below was taken at this event (by Paul Moss - see www.astronomy.net.nz) and was picked up by Sky and Telescope magazine for their recent article on IYA2009 and 100HA events. The photo has now been published in both the US and Australian editions of that magazine! You can read the article here. It is also being used as one of the 6 images for the official 100 Hours of Astronomy posters!
Worlds Largest Star Party!
Following on from our successes, the Levin StarGazers plan to hold the worlds largest star party on April 4th as part of the 100 Hours of Astronomy events that are happening worldwide! Everybody in our district is being invited to come down and view Saturn through a telescope. In addition to the main "Saturn-viewing" telescopes, there will be other group members showing other wonders in our skies, plus an information desk and a guest speaker giving presentations indoors. My company is donating a $500 telescope to give away as a prize to some lucky member of the public too! If the weather doesn't permit viewing, we have an inflatable cosmodome/planetarium that will be set up indoors for brief presentations to the public.
It should be a fantastic (and exhausting!) night. Here's hoping the public come along in their hundreds! The local newspapers and radio station have been very supportive in promoting the event, and the prize draw for the telescope will be done on live radio on the Monday following the event.
Wish us luck, and I hope that you are all planning wonderful events for the public too!
Regards, Mike
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Celestron SkyScout Personal Planetarium
Celestron is pleased to announce that they are 
Tags: newsletter
Throughout the year, Jeff Swick, Vice-President of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada (Saskatoon Centre), kept leaving off-the-wall comments on Celestron's Flickr Photo Albums hinting that Celestron should come out and visit a different part of Canada and experience the Saskatchewan Summer Star Party firsthand. For example, Jeff wrote "Come on....just a little more cable and we'll be able to plug into the Saskatchewan Summer Star Party." Well, after reading a comment like that, I conducted my own investigation and decided to read more about the SSSP, now in its 14th year. The SSSP is held yearly at Cypress Hills Inter-provincial Park, where its high elevation is filled with forests of pine and spruce trees along with abundant wildlife such as moose, elk and deer. At night, the magnitude 7 sky is filled with stars and is probably one of the darkest sites to observe from in all of Canada - a perfect place to hold this yearly gathering of astronomy enthusiasts - mainly from the Alberta and Saskatchewan provinces.
Celestron's Firmware Engineer, Derik DeVecchio, accompanied me on Celestron's first ever trip to the SSSP. After arriving in Calgary, we took at nice 4.5 hour scenic drive along the Trans-Canada Highway to Maple Creek and then on to Cypress Hills. We arrived on site as light drizzle began to fall, which soon turned to a steady downpour. The roads became muddy, and the grounds saturated with water, yet campers and RVs were still entering the Meadows to claim their campsite. We were immediately greeted and welcomed to the star party by our hosts - Ken From and Wade Williamson, of All-Star Telescopes; Jeff Swick, our initial contact person; Rick Huziak, Registrar & Registration and Les Dickson, Resort and Speaker Coordinator. Eventually, the rain subsided enough for us to set up a temporary table at the All-Star Telescope tent to meet and greet star party participants, but soon after, the rains returned, and we hurriedly took cover. That evening, a BBQ took place at the Recreation Hall (originally scheduled for the outdoor amphitheater). With good food and conversations, the BBQ dinner was a great place to mingle about, make new friendships and stay dry. Noted Canadian Astronomer and Author, Alan Dyer, introduced himself to us, and how great it was to finally got to meet the man behind one of our favorite astronomy books - "The Backyard Astronomer's Guide." I must say, the Canadian folks really went out of their way to make us feel welcomed!
Rain and foggy conditions continued to plague the Cypress Hills area into the next day with no letup in sight. Even though, everyone made the best out of the situation and congregated at the Cypress Hills Resort, located just around the corner from the Meadows, to talk astronomy and telescopes. Derik and I took a drive around the park to check out the local wildlife and scenic points before our afternoon meeting with Les. We eventually found our way back to the Meadows, but it was rather sad to see a field void of any telescopes. However, good news began circulating that the Clear Sky Chart pointed to clearing skies for Saturday night. Everyone remained optimistic and had their fingers crossed. After dinner, people started to gather downstairs in the huge Wapiti Room for the casual 5 - 15 minutes Friday Evening Talks. Scheduled presenters included Vance Petriew - Regina Centre's 100th Anniversary; Brian Richards - Kamloops Club Dome & Star Party; Chris Beckett - RASC Observing Certificate Program and Richard Huziak, The Grasslands Dark Sky Preserve.
Saturday morning started off with rain but soon became intermittent enough for people to return back to their campsites. All-Star Telescopes, with a fully erected tent, opened for business selling the must-have telescope essentials, while Derik and I interacted with attendees and answered questions. We also spent some time walking the Meadows to meet up with Celestron telescope owners to give them tips on how to better enhance their equipment's operations, which went over very well with everyone.
After lunch, nearly everyone drove back to the Cypress Hills Resort for the much anticipated "Saturday Talks" in the Wapiti Room, which Derik and I, along with Alan Dyer and Stan Shadick, were scheduled to speak. About 250 plus people were in the audience as Alan began the talks by delivering his presentation of "Latest and Greatest Images of Neat Things in the Sky." Alan's provided stunning astrophotography works from Chile and incredible time lapsed videos of the night sky. In addition, Alan shared his "unlucky" 13th eclipse expedition images from Tahiti. His previous 12 eclipse adventures had been all clear.
Derik and I were up next, and we divided our talks into two parts - Marketing and Engineering presentations. My presentation was titled "Celestron on-the-go and its 50th Anniversary." I spoke about my 10 years with the company, and my first meeting with Celestron's Founder, Tom Johnson, when I was a young boy. I went on to speak about the many star parties and school outreach programs Celestron have been involved with this year, and I highlighted Celestron's 50th Anniversary, and how Tom got started in developing a passion of building large aperture, affordable, high quality telescopes. I also discussed our 50th Anniversary Mini-Site on Celestron's Homepage, and at the conclusion, I played the trailer from our Documentary film "The Path of Light," which received a loud applause from the audience. Derik spoke next and gave a humorous yet serious presentation on "Getting the most out of your Celestron Go-To Telescope." He informed the audience how most customers usually skip over reading the instruction manual and therefore, miss out on many key handcontrol features which would greatly enhance their viewing experience. Throughout his presentation, Derik constantly reminded the audience to "read the manual" which generated much laughter from the audience and became the theme of the entire presentation. I rejoined Derik for 10 minutes of questions and answers immediately following his presentation. We answered as many questions as we could until Les crossed his arms to signal that our time was up. After the presentation, both Derik and I held our own impromptu workshops to give advices on handcontrol features and SCT collimation tips.
Stan gave the final talk of the afternoon with his very informative presentation of "Investigating Exoplanets with Small Telescopes." He covered what scientist have learned about the properties of exoplanets in over 380 planetary systems, and even how amateurs may be able to contribute to finding additional exoplanets. What a great afternoon of talks.
After the presentations concluded, the Awards Ceremony took place followed by the Door Prize Draw. Awards were given in various categories including the 10th Anniversary Awards for those who have attended at least 10 of the last 14 SSSPs. One winner was 9 year old Emily Petriew, daughter of Vance Petriew, who had discovered comet P/2001 Q2 Petriew at the 2001 SSSP! Emily had attended her first ever SSSP even before her first birthday! Other awards categories included the Finest NGC Awards and the Astro Photo & Sketch Contest Awards. A Volunteer Prize Draw was held, where winners were picked beforehand, including our own Derik DeVecchio, who won a green laser pointer from a competitor of all things! Finally, the grand Door Prize Draw took place. Darrel Chatfield, door prize coordinator, called up Ken (All-Star Telescopes) along with Derik and me to the front to draw winners of the SkyMaster 25x70 binocular, a NexStar 127SLT and a 114LCM. Each of us took turns drawing and announced the winning numbers. Below are some of the lucky winners.
A group photo was taken outside followed by the delicious Dinner Banquet back in the Wapiti Room. By this time, the sky was filled with white puffy clouds and lots of blue skies! Being higher up in latitude also meant longer summer days here, even during the dinner hour. The Clear Sky Chart correctly predicted the weather outlook as everyone was eager to finish dinner and get back to the Meadows to salvage one last clear night of observing. When darkness fell, the night sky definitely lived up to everyone's expectation. The Milky Way soon arched its way across the dark filled starry sky, and we gasped at seeing the myriad of stars from one of the best sites on the planet. Every now and then, bright meteors from the Perseids Meteor Shower lit up the sky to a chorus of "oohs!" Just a short walk away, a public star party took place at the tennis courts, where park visitors, comprised mostly of families, converged to listen to an expert guide who provided beginners with a tour of the summer constellations. To look up and see M13, M31, the Sagittarius Star Cloud and more with the naked eyes, we knew this place was very special.
The next morning, we stopped at the Meadows one last time to say our goodbyes to all the new friends we made at the SSSP. To leave all this wonderful nature behind, especially with clearer days ahead was hard to do, but we reminded ourselves that there will always be a "next time." We would like to say a big "thank you" to the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada (Saskatoon Centre), Barb Wright, Jeff Swick, Rick Huziak, Les and Ellen Dickson, Alan Dyer, Darrel Chatfield, Kathleen Houston, Chris Beckett, Regina Centre, Ken From and Wade Williamson of All-Star Telescopes and many other dedicated volunteers that put on a wonderful 2010 SSSP and welcomed us (Celestron) to this great annual event. Hopefully, we'll be invited back for a future SSSP, but until then, just remember Derik's famous quotation - "read the manual."
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I just placed an order for an SkyShed Pod! Shipping is at least 4 weeks though... Anyways, I'm sure I'll be able to get seriously back into imaging thanks to it . Can't wait!
On Wednesday evening, June 16, 2010, two very popular American classic rock bands - The Doobie Brothers and Chicago, returned to Southern California and performed a 3 hour set before a large audience at the indoor Gibson Amphitheatre at Universal CityWalk, Universal City, CA. Long time Doobie Brothers' singer, songwriter and musician, John McFee, who also happens to be an avid amateur astronomer and a good friend, invited me to attend the concert as one his guests. Any fan who grew up with their music, can surely attest to the band's unique style of rock and roll mixed in with a touch of blues.
Upon my arrival, I met up with some of John's other guests, including Stevie Nicks' bandmates - background vocalist, Sharon Celani and guitarist, Carlos Rios. Luckily for us, traffic wasn't too bad getting to the venue, but we just made it to our seats with 10 minutes to spare before show time. The Doobie Brothers opened up first with a pair of fan favorites including: "Take Me in Your Arms" and "Jesus is Just Alright" which got the audience standing on their feet early on. The band then surprised everyone with a couple of new songs from an upcoming album that's slated to be released later this year. Unfortunately, I don't recall the names of these new songs, but they were just as good as some of their older classics (in my opinion). Judging by the crowd's enthusiastic reaction, it seemed most felt the same way too.
The set included many more fan favorites like "Long Train Running," "Black Water" and an oldie song which I've never heard before but liked instantly - "Clear as the Driven Snow." I liked the song so much that I even downloaded it to my iPhone that same night.
During the intermission and set change, Carlos, Sharon and I went backstage to hangout with John and keyboard player, Guy Allison. This was the band's time to relax a bit, meet up with their friends and family members and also to have dinner. You know, I always wondered how a band passes the time before they go back out on stage, and now I know.
Chicago performed next with a full horn section which just electrified the crowd. The band performed some of their biggest hits including "Hard Habit to Break," "You're the Inspiration," "Hard to Say I'm Sorry," and "Saturday in the Park." Although it seemed a bit strange not hearing former vocalist, Peter Cetera, singing those songs, the band still sounded great, but I must say again that their horn section was nothing short of spectacular that brought a lot of soul and energy to their music.
The Doobie Brothers joined Chicago on stage during the encore set and both bands played a number of additional hits from each other, including: "Listen to the Music," "Takin it to the Streets," "Free" and "25 or 6 to 4," to name a few. How cool to see 17 musicians up on stage together at the same time with a huge American flag as the backdrop. With 4 guitar players, 2 bass players, 4 keyboard players, 4 horn players and 3 drummers keeping the same beat, the encore was simply sensational with the added harmonies that complimented each band's styles. The Doobie Brothers and Chicago will continue to perform on tour together in the U.S. through July, so if they stop over in your town, I highly recommend you check them out. And don't forget to "shout out" to John when you see him on stage performing. It'll be an evening you won't soon forget.
On the 6th I finally took the telescope out. I invited my buddy Shy which has never seen my telescope and we've been trying to get together for the longest time. First we did some visual observing , starting with Venus, Mars and Saturn. The continued with a globular cluster (M something), a planetary nebula (NGC 6210) and galaxy (M104 / Sombrero). The planetary nebula was small indeed but it had a clear blue hint to it. M104, although faint and requiring averted vision, you could tell the angle that the dust lane follows.
The atmosphere was quite steady, so I brought the DMK and took a single image of Saturn, mostly so Shy could see how the process go. I took 3000 frames at 1/15 s videos per channel, chose about 40% for R and G and 60% for B, and process them quickly (Registax for stacking and wavelets, MaximDL to generate the RGB image, AstraImage for deconvolution and Photoshop for increased saturation and cleaning the surroundings). The results was surprisingly pleasant. I'll probably revisit it and see if I can get a slightly less noisy image but here is the result nonetheless.
On a clear and cold Wednesday evening, December 16, 2009, a group of well know telescope manufacturers (Celestron, Explore Scientific and Meade Instruments) came together, not as competitors, but as educators to participate in a one hour public seminar aimed at the beginning astronomy crowd looking to purchase their first telescope, spotting scope, binocular or other astronomically related product this holiday season for themselves or for gift giving. The venue was the Leonard Nimoy Event Horizon Theater, inside the famed Griffith Park Observatory, which overlooks the city of Angels. A star party would immediately follow the presentation outside on the observatory's front lawn with additional representatives on hand to demonstrate products highlighted during the seminar. The presentation began promptly at 7:30 p.m. with Griffith Observatory's Astronomical Observer, Anthony Cook, taking on dual roles as host and presenter.
Tony started off the evening by introducing basic telescope concepts and useful telescope terminology including different types of optical configurations, the importance of aperture (light gathering ability), mountings and magnification. He also spoke about the usefulness of binoculars, and its ability to scan a wide swath of the night sky for unprecedented views of the Milky Way. I was up next (by alphabetical order of the manufacturers) and spoke first on why Griffith Observatory played a major role in my life - as the place where I first looked through a telescope and saw Saturn's rings as a young boy, which inspired me to have a lifelong interest in astronomy and telescopes. I then proceeded to discuss some of Celestron's most popular products which were specifically designed towards the beginning amateur astronomer - The SkyScout, FirstScope and the NexStar SE telescope lineup. Time was limited to only 10 minutes per presenter, so I only had enough time to discuss some of the major highlights of each product. Next up was Scott Roberts, President of Explore Scientific, and well known for his prominent role in promoting astronomical outreach. Scott discussed the importance of public outreach awareness and introduced some his company's telescopes to the audience. Chris Morrison, Vice-President, Support Services, Meade Instruments, followed suit and rounded out the talks by speaking of his company's recommended products designed for the beginning astronomer as well. With just a few minutes to spare, a question and answer session took place, which was then immediately followed by the star party.
After a week long period of rain, the sky was clear and all of our favorite objects to view - Jupiter, M42, Double Cluster, M45, M35, Castor, Albireo and more, were plainly visible above the beautiful Los Angeles city skyline. Celestron's Marketing Manager, Michelle Meskill and Marketing Coordinator, Yasmine Rios, accompanied me to the event and were on hand demonstrating and allowing visitors to "test drive" our products, so they could get a feel on how user friendly and fun our products are to use. Chris and Scott also had their fellow representatives on hand doing the same. The star party provided a wonderful avenue for prospective telescope buyers to meet with the representatives, try out a variety of different telescopes and ask questions and receive helpful advices. And yes, the "oohs" and "aahs" could be heard throughout the lawn. By 9:45 p.m. the park ranger came by and made an announcement signaling the end of the star party, and like all successful star party events, time always goes by quickly, especially when everyone is having a good time.
Celestron would like to thank Griffith Observatory and especially Anthony Cook, for inviting all the local, major telescope manufacturers to participate in this first ever Pre-holiday Telescope Buyer's Guide seminar workshop. It was great teaming up (for a change) with Chris and Scott and their respective organizations. Hopefully, everyone who attended the event will now have a better understanding of telescopes or binoculars and will make a good choice of bringing the night sky a little closer this gift giving holiday season and beyond. Happy Holidays everyone!
My new CPC 9.25 arrived yesterday morning around 1100. I purchased it in person at Astronomics in Norman on Friday. They shipped in Monday and it was here the next day. They didn't have a CPC on display but I had done my research and knew what I wanted. I was still suprised at the mass of this thing as I was unpacking the scope. I had downloaded all the manuals and read up before the arrival of the scope. This made the assembly of the scope a breeze. I think the CPC is the easiest scope I have ever assembled. The only thing in the manual that didn't jive with the scope involved the mounting of the finderscoe dove plate. The instructions don't mention that the screws must be removed from the scope and even warn you not to install the screws without the assembly in place to avoid damaging the mirror. Obviously, this has been remedied and the the screws come installed in the scope from the factory.
As I said, the scope is a breeze to set up. You remove the tripod (which is very sturdy and well built, in my opinion) and install the accessory tray. This takes just a couple of minutes. Let me say that this scope is a whole new adventure for me. This is my first large scope short of an 8 inch dob. Most of my scopes have been of the ETX line or smallish reflectors. I have always enjoyed my scopes but the CPC is the highest quailty scope I have owned. Anyway, after the quick assembly of the tripod, you remove the scope from the box. The packing done by Celestron is top notch. I was worried seeing some dings on the box after Fed-Ex dropped of the scope but it was for naught. The scope was very well packed and it would have taken major external damage to get to the scope. Basically, you just remove the scope from the box and set it on the tripod. The centering pin is a great idea and it helps with installing such a large scope. Once the three attachmnet bolts are secure, you can finish up the assembly of the scope. All that is left is installing the handheld computer holder and the finderscope. After that, you can mount the visual back, diagonal and eyepiece. I will post some photos of the unpacking process later.
As usual, my first night with the scope was spent indoors. We had rain and clouds all evening. The forcast for tonight wasn't much better. I checked shortly after sundown the the sky was almost completely clear! I had the scope disassembled, moved to the garage and reassembled in about 5 minutes. I let it cool down for a bit (not nearly long enough for good viewing but this was mostly a test run). It was then moved to the driveway as it offers the most sky here at my house. Light pollution is terrible, though. I lined up my fiderscope using the moon. Once that was accomplished, I did the alignment procedure. Everything went perfect and I had a match. I did a goto back to the moon and it was dead center in the eyepiece. Tracking was perfect as far as I could tell. I also looked at Jupiter and it's moons using the included 40mm eyepiece. I then fired up the tour feature and hit M101, M34, M31, and M32. The wife and kid came out to spend some time looking at the full moon. I was surprised at everything I could see inspite of the moon being full.
I also check collimation and it looks perfect to me so no adjustment required. I also hit two double stars. I had forgetten how beautiful they can be.
By this time I was freezing my tail off so I packed up and lugged everything back in the house. It was around 38 degrees F and I wasn't even close to properly dressed for the cold. My next outing will have a proper cool down period and better clothing for the cold. Can't wait..I had a blast tonight!
The Calm before the Storm..
As the Moon subsides,all the telescopes are coming back out an i have Hurricane Ida in route..8^(..
But before my sky's go cloudy for week i took Terminater09' out in the back yard an went to work...
Couple nights before the weather was iffy,so i had just brought out the Nexstar8SE for moon an planet shots between the clouds.I caught Nov.1.09 full moon in 15 seconds!! in to only time it left the clouds for 30 seconds!! All Night!!
Earlier in the mornings i had caught Mars...It ,at unbelievable magnification, moved All over the place.i got it on film but you can tell i'm out of my scopes useful magnification..
Friday,Nov.6-7th 09 i had Clear sky's ...Good enough to bring out Terminater09' for some Astrophototagraphy!!
It 8pm...
This below was a "First shot" after the set-up(carry-out,set-up,align,attach cams an cords etc etc),single frame(the rest had tree in it)220sec 1600iso f0 T1i shot...
The M11 Wild Duck Star Cluster
Next.. i went to the M103 Star Cluster,was very colorful to just the eye alone..
This one below was super dense,There stars everywhere!!
The NGC789 Star group
This one i've hit with the G10 last year,..This Time with T1i,prime focus,8SE tube,CGEM..
The NGC457 E.T. Star Cluster...
It now 9pm est..Was amazed i captured 4 star clusters in just an hour..8^)...
This below, i Captured the 7th ,Saturday night ,while Galaxy hunting..The Double Cluster..
Now the Moons was starting to rize out of the East...
Above is the Moon,Jet passing an under it all is "Terminator09'" L.E.D.S...
This was neat view of the Moon,The shot is in Focus,just the clouds are moving...
While the Cloud patch blew threw,there moving pretty fast due to Ida in the gulf, i went back in the house for bit...
When i came back out ,i started checking objects again on starry nights pro..I heard a russle of bushes!!!
I grabbed the flash light,stood-up an began searching the area where the noise came from..
It wasn't just a light brush of a bush,sounded pretty heavy..
I own a Cat,she's black an weighs about 11lbs now.Some times she get's out an cruises the backyard
I'm standing up,i run the flashlight down my back wall an Holy Moly!!!
Somethings Looking Dead at Me!!!
In this photo above you can see A-Whole lot more then i could that night beings it's past midnight.. when i previewed this shot in the back the camera i saw nothing but Red Eye's eyeing me..
I turned around an took a shot of my pool area...
OK...It's not my cat..
Time for close-up an hope i don't get Attacked!!!
I climbed up on my stored Tahoe in the backyard under a cover an snapped away...
One Opposum !!!..my first spotlight of'm made him Play Dead...lol..He's playing dead mid-fence-climb..heh
In this close-up you can see his/her Blue an Red different colored ears...
Even stranger his Eye's where Blue an Red Too..but opposite of his ears..It was Aleast 4 feet long including the tail!!!
It finaily left one my trips in the house for drink..
I went back to Scoping,the clouds had cleared...for now..
Below is a Super Processed Moon Shot..
only took 15 seconds to capture in HD, but took 2 an 1/2 Hours!!! of processing to complete...
If you light a lighter or match below your view of it..the heat vapor from the heat makes this shot come alive!!
Now Mars is above the Palm tree...
Off with the T1i, on with the G10,25X7mm zoom lens an x2 barlow..
I'm out of useful magnification in this shot along with slight dew an one my culmination screws could use 1/3 turn i can tell, so this is a project in works..
There special Mars filters out i've seen as well..
This is as close as you get with 8"
It's Saturday night,
These are my next interest....Galaxy's...
I'm in Orlando,FL so there a real challenge!!...
these below are just single frame shots ,2minx1600, to get me formularized with there size an locations at prime focus
NGC253 Sculpture galaxy
M31 The core of the Andromeda galaxy
NGC6946 galaxy..(have to look hard,but it's in the lower mid part this frame below)
Last is the M74 Phantom Galaxy...it's a ghost alright!!
Like i said before,these galaxys above where just 2 min iso1600 single frame photos with a moon out..
More to come with darksky's an no clouds!!
I'll be likely unable to scope for week or more now till Hurricane Ida passes..But i got my fill in for now..Enjoy!!
Bozo
http://www.celestronimages.com/member.php?action=showprofile&user_id=2306
ing on. The night sky is sowed with large and small countless stars as if a panorama reversed the shining sandy beach.
Beyond Midnight the Orionids rised in the east. The Orion Nebula spreaded its wing wide. I expected meteoroids looking up the sky. It had been quiet momentarily. Then a sharp light with white gases slashed the dark sky suddenly. Again quietness came. It was done over. I counted 12 per a half hour. The meteor shower features fast and created a shining trail of gases.
By the way, it is the Herschel objects I want to talk this time. Last week I read "The Herschel objects and How to Observe Them" written by Mr. James Mullaney, F.R.A.S that is translated into Japanese. The revolutionary book for Japanese astronomers has deeply impressed me with the honorable achievement by William Herschel and observing Herschel objects. I learned for the first time that he had observed mostly with two 20ft telescopes equipped 30cm and 47cm mirror than a giant 40th, made his catalog of deep sky objects with them.
At Once I've tried to search and watch, sketch them with Celestron NexStar 102 SLT. It wasn't easy to recognize Herschel objects by my telescope first. I see there wasn't an object in the sight where it ought to be by low power, but looked about there for a minute, and appeared it vaguely, then saw by higher power, next found it surely. This time I tried open clusters. A lot of them were small, pale or sparse. But I was greatly touched by them, because all of them ware astronomical open clusters that ware different from superficial gathers rightly. I've amazed that he with his younger sister devoted his life to hunting the sky for them and accomplished to make his list of 2508 objects in the 18th century when Astrometry had been all and Astrophysics was not. I've realized so when I searched and watched sketched 18 open clusters in them.
I show all of my observation. They were not very good because I was insufficient and often interrupted clouds. From now on, I'll try the supplementary Herschel objects of the book. I would like to express to Mr. James Mullaney my gratitude for a lot of suggesting how to observe them.
Class 6
H 31-6 (NGC663), Cas, Type; OC, M;7.1, Size; 16′ Note; 17 Aug,2009. Seeing; 4 Eyepiece; 9mm (×89) |
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H 30-6 (NGC7789), Cas, Type; OC, M; 6.7, Size; 16′ Note; 17 Aug,2009. S2 Eyepiece; 9mm (×89) View; It seems like cloud when looking in it. A lot of very small stars are twinkling when looking at it out from the corner of my eye.
×89
Class 7
H 45-7 (NGC436), Cas, Type; OC, M; 8.8, Size; 6′ Note; 17 Aug,2009. Seeing; 4 Eyepiece; 9mm (×89) View; A few stars seem in a small cloud. The cloud cannot is distinguished thoroughly.
×89
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H 48-7 (NGC559), Cas, Type; OC, M; 9.5, Size; 7′ Note; 17 Aug,2009. Seeing; 4 Eyepiece; 9mm (×89) View; It's very open as if doubtful. But it is an open cluster surely.
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H 49-7 (NGC637), Cas, Type; OC, M; 8.2, Size; 4′Note; 17 Aug,2009. Seeing; 4 Eyepiece; 9mm (×89) View; Some stars appear like a rough cloud when looking at it out from the corner of my eye.
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H 46-7 (NGC654), Cas, Type; OC, M; 6.5, Size; 5′ Note; 17 Aug,2009. Seeing; 4 Eyepiece; 9mm (×89) View; Many twinkle stars appear when looking at it out from the corner of my eye.
×89
H 47-7 (NGC1502), Cam, Type; OC, M; 5.7, Size; 8′ Note; 20 Aug,2009. Seeing; 5 Eyepiece; 12mm (×67) View; It's very beautiful. Golden two stars are bright and small stars spread out in four directions evenly.
×67
H 56-7 (NGC7790), Cas, Type; OC, M; 8.5, Size; 17′ Note; 17 Aug,2009. Seeing; 2 Eyepiece; 9mm (×89) View; Small cloud appears around three stars.
×89
Class 8
H 59-8 (NGC129), Cas, Type; OC, M; 6.5, Size; 21′ Note; 20 Aug,2009. Seeing; 5 Eyepiece; 12mm (×67) View; Small stars dot sparsely a equilateral. |
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×67 |
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H 70-8 (NGC1582), Per, Type; OC, M; 7p, Size; 37′ Note; 20 Aug,2009. Seeing; 2 Eyepiece;12mm (×67) View; A round arch, which traced with six bright stars, is prominent. There are small stars along it but very few in the inside.
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| ×67 |
H 67-8 (NGC7160), Cep, Type; OC, M; 6.1, Size; 7′ Note; 18 Aug,2009. Seeing; 2 Eyepiece; 9mm (×89) View; A slender cross shapes from four brighter stars. Small stars dot sparsely around the star, which is the top of the cross.
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H 77-8 (NGC7380), Cep, Type; OC, M; 7.2, Size; 12′ Note; 18 Aug,2009. Seeing; 4 Eyepiece;12mm (×67) and 9mm (×89) View; By a 67-power, the shape of T seem like cloud. By 89-power, Seven stars has pointed like a shape of a spoon. Small stars are studded sparsely.
×67
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H 69-8 (NGC7686), And, Type; OC, M; 5.6, Size; 15′ Note; 20 Aug,2009. Seeing; 4 Eyepiece; 12mm (×67) View; Four stars, which include the brightest red star, form trapezoid and small stars dot sparsely.
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Excuse me, I cannot write well in English.
Well... not the one you probably were expecting for sure, but my big bang on astronomy. Since young I was thrilled about stars, planets and so on. During my youth I always lived on the countryside where lights during the night were minimal. I remember I could see very well the milky way and a night sky full of stars. Now... I live in the middle of a city where I can see about 10% of what I could see by that time, but once in a while I go to my parents home and when the night comes, I stay outside for a while appreciating the show the skies are presenting.
So, now was the time to begin a "thing" a always wanted to. It was though to "convince" my wife to buy a telescope... I even had to "put" some new ideas in my older daughter first in order to have the job half way done ha ha! But it was after all no big deal. Anyway, after reading some reviews and users comments, I've decided on the Celestron CPC 9.25 since I was curious not only for the observation itself, but also about getting some images of what I was able to see.
Here in Portugal when products arrive, they are amazingly high, so I had to get the scope and the extra material from outside, and like many of you I believe I started to search on the internet stores in Europe that would offer the best price. Built an Excel spreadsheet with all the stores, it's prices, the shipping cost to Portugal, and after that the analyses were must easier to do and I could see that in U.K. there were the best offer, the prices were great since the Sterling pound were getting weaker than Euro by this time, so I had the opportunity to save some extra Euros with this. So, I picked Opticstar to deal with, decision that I later deeply regretted. From the beginning it was all great, they offer me this and that and I was really happy with the potential transaction, however when I put my order online the problems started. Mr. Karbolounis asked me after this to make 1£ transfer to their account in order to have my bank account data (since I was paying by credit card) and to secure themselves that I was a trustee person. This transfer cost me 17€ in fees (money that I never got back), and know they were expecting me to send a confirmation number in order to release the telescope! A confirmation number I asked ? but... I never received a e-mail or what so ever with a confirmation number... I reply! Mr. Karbolounis, keep saying that without it they could not send the goods, even after I transfer 1£ to their account. So I thought, that all of the talk Mr. Karboulonis were saying was "crap" (I'm sorry for the language) and he was just lying to me all the time, promising he could deliver the telescope and the extras by a deadline date I established but he could not honour from the beginning. So I removed the order, by credit card company deleted the transaction and I turned to the second store on the list.
Like someone said... "One happy customer worth ten, one unhappy worth an hundred..."
Mr. Simon and Mr. Neil Richardson from Telescope Planet has been outstanding with me and within 1 week after committed the transaction, I was receiving 2 big boxes with my new "toy". Now I'm awaiting for the Celestron eyepiece kit and some filters in order to enjoy the full capability of the CPC 925.
So, I hope skies keep clear like it has been for the past 2 weeks and let me play during late hours for a while... I'll try to keep this blog up to date with my feelings, achievements and disillusions...
Clear skies to all!
Tags: start
I imagine with seeing the member's profile photo. What situation does everybody watch and take a photo the night sky in? Are you in a prairie or a vast plain stretching as far as you can see? Or are you in a favorite observatory of your own composition or a balcony of your house? I've stretched my imagination and given my heart to amateur astronomers in the world with friendship. I show you my watching situation. Fukuyama city I live is in Hiroshima Prefecture. My city has about a 426,000 population and the large scale iron foundry. I live on the west outskirts of the urban district. The east sky is covered with the light of the city at night. But I have a passable starry sky at midnight and enjoy astronomy. When it will be clear night sky, I am going ot walk to my fahavorite poin with my telescope. This is Japanese shrine in my path.
I'll walk in five minuites on this way.
Then I'll arrived at a children's field. Here is my point to object night sky.
This is a view near my house.
The rice paddy fields are spread over.
Amaryllidaceous flowers blossom in the shore of ditches tending to rice paddy fields.
I often commute to my office on National route2 by my bicycle. There is my office at Kasumi shopping arcade.
By the way, Look at my new sketches, please. The following is my sketch with Celestron Next Star 102 SLT.
M39 in Cygnus；×20 M15 in Pegasus;×88
NGC 7331 in Pegasus;×88 The Pleiades（M45)in Taurus ;×20
How beautiful the Pleiades is! Blule stars gather around. I was gazing at the open cluster . It was very difficult to dot the position of star one by one exactly. I mistaked the positions of some stas and erased the pencil marks with an eraser to put right. But some pale erased marks seem in the circle.
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Starfest, the 28th annual celebration of astronomy, took place on August 20-23, 2009 at the River Place Park family campground site. Starfest is recognized as one of the top seven star parties in North America by Sky & Telescope magazine and is visibly Canada's largest annual observing convention and star party. Nearly 600 astronomy enthusiasts from Canada and the USA joined in with the festivities.
This past February, I was contacted by Starfest President and Team Leader, Malcolm Park, who came across and enjoyed reading my Starfest 2008 blog. After speaking with our Canadian Senior Sales Representative, Gary Stephey and I, Malcolm asked if we were interested in giving a talk at this year's event. We agreed and throughout the spring, Gary and I tossed around several presentation ideas and discussed how we would strategize our presentation. As the months flew by, summer came upon us rather quickly and with the announcement of new products such as the new EdgeHD optical system, we thought how great it would be if we also included an Engineer who was actively involved in its development. I spoke with Celestron's Vice President of Engineering, Corey Lee to see if he would be available, and he was. Our presentation team was set.
Corey and I flew out to Canada on August 19, 2009 and met up with Gary in Toronto. During the drive up to the site, we heard stories how clear the weather had been the previous few nights, and as we made our way into River Place Park (home of Starfest), we were greeted by green, lush hills dotted with RVs and campers - a familiar sight seen each year. The weather forecast wasn't too optimistic with 30% to 40% showers predicted throughout the weekend with a possibility of some clearing on Saturday night. Looking up, things didn't look too promising. We staked out our usual location near the Red Light Cafe and set up our tent. With dark, ominous clouds moving into the area, we decided not to chance it in case it started to rain, so we left our products in the truck, as did most other vendors on site. It was a good thing because someone ran out and yelled that a Tornado Warning has been issued within our vicinity! It was kind of shocking to hear because we didn't think tornadoes formed this high up in Canada - we were wrong! Before we knew it, black and light clouds began circulating, greenish clouds began to appear, rain began to fall, lightning lit up the sky and thunder boomed throughout the campground. Within 15 minutes, looking out towards the west, we spotted the first tornado funnel cloud, perhaps an F1, that developed and touched down a mile or so away. It wasn't your typical well defined tornado, and it was slightly broken up as it hung from the sky and eventually made landfall. We lost sight of it as trees nearby hid it from view, but towards the north, more clouds were beginning to circulate. People were just in awe as we saw twin lightly colored vortices making landfall about 2 miles away. Luckily, they were moving towards the east and away from Starfest but we feared for the people in neighboring towns that were directly in the path of the twisters. The severe storms, ripped through the Durham-Markdale and Craigleith area (Grey County) leaving a wake of destruction, including down trees and damaged homes. Starfest fared much better; however, a few tents were damaged or destroyed by high winds. For us, the Celestron tent remained intact, but our fellow neighbor's tent didn't fare too well.
The next day, we were greeted by the Sun and partly cloudy conditions. Vendors began setting up their equipment for display, as we had a window of opportunity before the next storm was scheduled to blow through. We displayed several telescopes including a new CGEM 800 HD, which brought out the curious, as well as our popular star party staples - the CPC 800 and NexStar 6 SE. The CGE Pro 1100 HD would not make its debut until the following morning. We outfitted our NexStar 6 SE with a solar filter and used the CPC 800 for terrestrial viewing, but sadly, that was about all the observing we did at Starfest this year. By late afternoon, the clouds began rolling in again and any attempts to observe the sky remained fruitless.
Saturday morning (presentation day) was as gray as could be. No Sun and no blue sky to be seen. We were still quite upbeat and excited because not only would we be presenting our "What's new with Celestron" talk after lunch, but also because our CGE Pro mount finally arrived for us to display for our guests. Corey, Gary and I spent most of the day fielding questions about the mount and new optical system. New products always seem to get the most attention. After the lunch hour, we made our way to the smaller tent and prepared for our presentation. We were up against some stiff competition as another talk was scheduled for the main tent, and the swap meet took place concurrently. Nonetheless, we had a good sized audience present as Gary led off our "What's new with Celestron" presentation. Gary discussed some of the major highlights in Celestron's 49 year history including our founder; Tom Johnson's first built and sold SCT to the latest EdgeHD Optical System and every major milestone in-between. I was up next and discussed my history with the company to the various roles and positions I held throughout my nearly 10 years with the company. I also discussed the company's role as global sponsors of IYA 2009, various events and star parties we've participated in so far in 2009, as well as our new social networking sites - CelestronLife.com and CelestronImages.com. I then passed the baton over to Corey, who presented the new EdgeHD Optics and discussed its design and features. He explained how the new optical system produces a focal plane more than three-times flatter than a standard Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope and corrects for off-axis coma. Corey then showed images of celestial objects focused on axis, which depicted sharp, uniform stars across the entire FOV. New mechanical features of the EdgeHD were also explained in detail. We had fun conducting the presentation and felt confident we were able to bring something of value to the audience members.
With absolutely no hope at all for any kind of observing due to the persistent cloud cover, many vendors began to break down their tents and packed up their belongings. The big banquet took place inside the main tent as people lined up across the vendor's field for the delicious dinner and dessert. Soon after, the announcements and door prize festivities began and similar to last year, baseball caps were tossed into the audience that really got the crowd going. The Canadians absolutely knows how to have a good time. Celestron donated several "Eyes on the Skies" DVDs, a FirstScope and the grand prize, a NexStar 8 SE. Our Canadian Senior Sales Representative, Gary Stephey, was called up to the stage to do the honors of selecting the winning tickets. One by one, the lucky winners came forth to collect their prizes. When the time came to draw the grand prize, all were eerily silent throughout the tent. Suddenly, a surprised and shocked Pat McLaren of Elora, Ontario, stepped forward to claim her telescope to the cheers of the crowd. Pat mentioned that she and her husband have been coming to Starfest since 2001 and never expected to win anything other than just a cap. Surprise Pat! We're sure you'll be enjoying and sharing the views with everyone around you, including your husband, who just so happens to always been a hardcore DOB kind of guy. Maybe he'll see what CATS can do too?
Starfest 2009 is going down in the history book as the year tornadoes paid an unexpected visit. However, no amounts of rain, lightning or even a few tornadoes will ever blow away the enthusiasm of the people who regularly attends this great event each year. It just so happens luck hasn't been on our side lately, but even though, we must all remain positive and hope next year brings clear skies for all. Our luck is surely bound to change. Corey and I departed Toronto safely the next day, and upon our return back to the office, we had many interesting nature stories to share with our fellow co-workers. Californians are used to earthquakes but tornadoes are a different story. We'll return back to Starfest next year, and we'll make sure to let Malcolm know to save us our usual spot by the Red Light Cafe. Until the next event, clear skies to you all.
Ｉam taking a coffee break in spare moments from my work. :) I am in practice at blog because I fail to link photos up my blog.
This sketch is M71 in Sagitta what we call "arrow" with CPC1100 and 32mm eyepiece, 87-power. The features; Distribution of stars is a little irregular. One side of ball is dispersed and blighter stars can be seen. Another side is concentrated and not discretely. It was a joyful sight.
We can see the different shapes of globular clusters in the night sky if we look at an object carefully.
By the way, does my photo show?
31 December, 1969
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In the Shadow of the Moon – My China Total Solar Eclipse Adventure July 17-30, 2009
I finally got the pictures done - I took a thousand and have placed about 600-700 online in two albums.
All kinds of interesting stuff - China itself, fellow eclipse chasers, quest for the tidal wave, Purple Mountain Observatory, ancient astro instruments, modern Synta plant (that's where a lot of Celestrons are made), etc.
Check it out!
Summer in East Central China and the prospects for the longest total solar eclipse for more than 100 years. An irresistIble trip for the astronomy, the food, people, scenery and Shaoxing wine.
Part I covers Shanghai Days, Jiaxing, Mission to Moganshan, Eclipse Nightfall Jiaxing, OOPS!, Hangzhou West Lake Story, Huangshan Shi orr is it Tunxi? (what's in a name?), Huangshan.
Part II covers Nanjing, Purple Mountain Observatory, On the Road to Suzhou, Synta Factory Suzhou, Zai jian China!
http://picasaweb.google.com/ProfessorPhoto/China2009InTheShadowOfTheMoonPartIShanghaiThroughHuangshan#
http://picasaweb.google.com/ProfessorPhoto/China2009InTheShadowOfTheMoonPartIINanjingThroughZaiJian#
Here we are again in the middle of summer and for us Californians, July means warm, sunny blue skies, sandy beaches, summer Milky Way and Oceanside Photo and Telescope's Southern California Astronomy Expo (SCAE)! How quickly an entire year has rolled around since the last SCAE 2008! This past Saturday, July 18, 2009, OPT Boss, Craig Weatherwax, hosted the 5th Annual SCAE event and invited down nearly 40 vendors of astronomical related gear to showcase their latest wares to the public. Just a week earlier, OPT held a very successful parking lot swap meet, followed by a film presentation and vendor star party at nearby Palomar College. Like always, the events were free and open to anyone interested in astronomy and telescopes. Part 2 of SCAE included a BBQ, mini presentation seminars by vendor reps, and the ever so popular "Raffle Prize Extravaganza" which this year, included an online giveaway for those who couldn't be at OPT in person. The best part - raffle tickets were free!
Celestron sent out a variety of representatives from different departments within the company. Vice President of Engineering, Corey Lee, came down to SCAE this year and presented a talk on the new EdgeHD optical system to a curious audience. With the official announcement made just 3 days earlier, the EdgeHD was no doubt, one of the most talked about new products at the event, and we were proud to have to have someone who worked extensively on the EdgeHD project conduct the presentation. The Marketing Department was represented by Marketing Coordinator, Yasmine Rios, who's already become an event veteran, and I, Community Relations Coordinator, Kevin Kawai. Representing the Repair Department included Repair and Returns Warehouse Supervisor, Daniel Fuentes and Lead Repair Technician, Hector Antuna. The "dynamic duo" can adjust, clean and repair nearly every Celestron telescope and mount! And finally, newly hired Special Sales Manager, Ben Hauck, joined in with the festivities and made his first public event debut with Celestron. Welcome aboard Ben!
The Celestron booth was located right in the middle of the upper level parking lot with two large tables to display our LCD Digital Microscopes, Axiom and Ultima eyepieces, Eyepiece kits, FirstScope and a SkyScout. In addition, there was ample table room for giveaways such as catalogs, sell sheets, IYA posters, beanies, caps, pens and Frisbees. With the Sun shining brightly throughout the day, we displayed our popular CPC 1100 and NexStar 8 SE telescopes for solar viewing even though there really hasn't been much activity on the Sun in recent memory. Still, the Sun is always a popular target to view through telescopes, and our guests agreed. We also set up a SkyMaster 25x100 binocular and a Regal 100F-ED spotting scope for terrestrial viewing. The CGE Pro 1100 HD and CGEM 800 HD were set up right in front of the booth and always had a steady stream of people that gathered around for a firsthand look at the new optical tube/mount setups. Some guests who came for a closer inspection included advanced imagers and visual astronomers. Those who missed out on Corey's presentation were still able to get an up close look at the new EdgeHD's mechanical features and learn how the optical system alleviates off-axis coma while producing a flat field. There was even a beginner who wanted to get into the hobby but wanted to start off with only the top-of-the-line equipment! Sure! Why not start with the latest and greatest?
By 6 PM, the vendor event officially came to an end, but not before the giant SCAE Giveaway commenced in its place with Craig serving as Master of Ceremonies. Thousand upon thousands of dollars worth of raffle prizes were up for grabs in the children, adult and online categories. This was the biggest raffle prize drawing ever and Celestron contributed with the prize pool too by donating an "Eyes on the Skies" DVD/Book and a FirstScope for the children's drawing and a CPC 800 for the adult gold prize. The children's raffle drawing took place first, and a very happy young girl won the FirstScope. Her big smile said it all as she claimed her prize! In keeping with tradition, for the past 2 years, our gold prize winners would always spend time talking to me earlier in the day before having their winning ticket drawn during the raffle. Would the same good fortune take place again this year? I did speak with quite a number of guests. When it came time for Celestron's gold prize to be drawn, Craig summoned Yasmine and I to the stage area and announced the winning number. Would there be a "three-peat" once again? Well, yes and no. The man with the winning ticket turned out to be Bob Buckner, an OPT SCAE regular who indeed spent some time at the Celestron booth talking to Yasmine earlier in the day. I have the photo to prove it - (see photo on bottom left). Although while Bob didn't actually speak with me, he did speak to Yasmine, so I guess that's good enough to keep the streak alive. Congratulations to Bob and hope you enjoy your new CPC 800.
Immediately at the conclusion of SCAE, we loaded up our belongings and joined the other vendors and OPT staff for a reception in the downstairs Art Gallery for cheese, wine, grapes and crackers. It was a relaxing way to recap the day's events with old friends and even with a few competitors, while making new acquaintances as well. Dinner immediately followed just walking distance away at Vigilucci's Italian Restaurant. Craig had rented out the entire restaurant, and the food was excellent like always after working a long, hard day. It was really amazing to see most of the major astronomical equipment manufacturers get together and dine together under one roof. Leave it to Craig to make it all happen. As always, Celestron would like to give a very big "thank you" shoutout to Craig and Leigh Weatherwax, Penny Distasio, Rayna Roberts, Eric Blackhurst and the entire staff at OPT for all your hard efforts in putting together another great SCAE event. There's no doubt a lot of planning, cooperation and coordination were involved, but for all your hard efforts, it brings together the best annual summertime astronomy event period. We'll see if there will be a "four-peat" during next year's raffle prize drawing. Until next time, enjoy the hobby and keep looking up! Click on the first picture in this blog recap to be automatically sent to the OPT SCAE 2009 photo album on Flickr Photos.
Well, it's been a while since I contributed here but this will be a short post. I just had to share the fact that our little astronomy club (Levin StarGazers) just won a global award for our participation in the 100 Hours of Astronomy event held in April!!! We won the Award Three section for Community Outreach, which is simply awesome, particularly when you consider there were something like 2370 registered events worldwide. The award will be recognised at the IAU General Assembly in Brazil in August.
A big thanks to Celestron too for the Sky Scout that we will be receiving as a prize. This will be extremely useful in our public outreach and educating both members of our club as well as members of the public.
On Saturday, June 6, 2009, Orion Telescopes held its first ever "Celestron Day" in the parking lot of its retail store. Being an Orion customer myself for many years, I was excited upon hearing the news of a Celestron Day and jumped at the opportunity to travel to Northern California (Cupertino) to be a part of a collaborated event between Celestron and a fellow respected name in the telescope industry - Orion Telescopes. Celestron firmware Engineer, Derik DeVecchio, and I headed out the day before and yours truly had the privilege of driving the cargo van up Interstate 5 for the 7 hour drive from Los Angeles to Cupertino. With several stops along the way for food and gas, we also encountered several large downpours, which was rather strange since California has been bone dry all year long. However, the storms were rather fast moving, and we quickly drove into clearer skies as we headed on our northward journey. Vice President of Sales, Victor Aniceto and Marketing Manager, Michelle Meskill, took a late afternoon flight and would later rendezvous with us at the hotel. That evening, the President of Orion Telescopes, Peter Moreo; Merchandising Manager, Anne Friscia; Purchasing Supervisor, Lisa Cudal; and Retail Store Manager, Ken Sablinsky joined us for a delicious pre-event dinner. It was a relaxing way for all of us to talk about the event and even catch up on other things in life such as sport scores, our families, and even earthquakes!
Saturday morning greeted us with clear skies, but the excitement was short lived as clouds began to buildup as the morning progressed. Luckily for us, it wasn't completely overcast. Derik and I arrived early, and we set up our Celestron tent in the parking lot just to the right of the Orion store. Soon after, Michelle and Victor joined us and busily prepared the table with all the goodies and giveaways, as we set up the CGE Pro 1400 and CGEM 1100 that we had brought along. Ken and his staff also provided us with additional Celestron scopes and binoculars to put on display, as well as providing solar filters for daytime observing. By 10:30 AM, the show began and slowly, guests started to arrive to check out our latest wares and take advantage of the big sale, and the additional special discount Orion offered on all Celestron products throughout the day. Having an Engineer along really complemented and solidified our staff, as we were well represented from a Sales, Marketing and Engineering standpoint. I have to say, it's really great to interact with customers and demo our gear at an event like this. Any suggestions and feedbacks are duly noted because every idea is of great value and are taken into consideration. With this in mind, Celestron can continue to come out with new or improve upon existing products that the consumer desires. The Sun played "peek-a-boo" throughout the afternoon, but at times, came out long enough from behind the clouds to allow guests to check out the solar disc. There's still no sunspot activity, but it's still cool to check out the Sun nonetheless.
Each hour, Michelle, conducted raffle prize drawings and gave away some really cool items, including several "International Year of Astronomy" official products such as the FirstScope, several "Eyes on the Skies" DVDs and books. Raffle prize drawings are always fun whether you win something or not. That FirstScope sure looked good. Even I wished I could have won that scope, although I wasn't eligible, because it sure would like nice on my desk as a conversation piece when I'm not using it to scan the skies at night. With lots prizes to raffle off, many people won something nice to take back home. By late afternoon, it was time to raffle off the Grand Prize, which consisted of a NexStar 60 SLT. People crowded around Michelle as she drew the winning ticket. A gentleman quickly shouted out that he had the winning number and came forward to claim his new telescope and pose for pictures. What an exciting way to end the day on a high note at the first "Celestron Day" at Orion Telescopes.
We would like to thank the staff at Orion Telescopes for sponsoring this successful event. We'll definitely be back again for the next one. Judging from the turnout and the positive responses, there will be more events like this in the future. If anyone finds themselves in Cupertino, CA, check out Orion Telescope's Retail Store, which is located in a convenient, modern mini-mall and say "hello" to Ken and his friendly knowledgeable staff. You'll find plenty of Orion and Celestron products to browse through. Next up, our road trip adventures continues on to the desert southwest, as we head out to the All Celestron Star Party titled "C-Row Star-B-Que" in Palominas, AZ. Hope to see you all there. Comments and feedback about this blog and others are greatly appreciated!
The G10 Punches me in the Eye!!..
Well..i still have my new modified Canon 5d T1i in route,along with a guide scope/camera combo package .Finally the Sky's have cleared-up over the weekend.The moon is now up so no deep-space searching allowed(G10 had draw backs anyway)..heh..So the Sun,Moon an Planets it is!!!..This my first Sun Spot, its numbers #1019, an still there today!! as of June 2nd,09!!
Added celestron's yellow filter along with there Sun filter as the shot above was from...
This Jet had to been more then 40 miles away at least,By eye was just a Orange Line on the horizon...
Distance planes are the Best to focus on if at Dusk you plan on some Satellite tracking/capturing...Now the Moons up, Past 1/4 phase almost at 1/2...Creator Hunting Time...First up, a re-due of the Apollo 11's Landing zone!!!
Now Arzachel,Alphonsus,Ptolemaeus
Aristillus,Archimedes,Montes Apenninus 
Since Saturn Right next to the moon, Figured oh why not...i haven't figured this out yet, but i get brighter shots while moons out then it's not...
That was close as i can come with-out hitting the lens rings limit shooting Afocally...This next one is more in range,small,but real fine lined,I get Titian as bonus!!Its 40 Frames stacked a processed with registax4...8^)
Last in this Blog is the Best...I Got ISS on Film From My Front Yard!!!....8^).....Below's my progress over the last 4 months!!.....Worst to Best to next day Photo Backing up settings...
After this last one above, the next night's pass was only mag 1.0 vs the clearest shot above at -0.6...Camera settings an the Best ISS Edited shot at ( http://www.celestronimages.com/details.php?image_id=3628&mode=search)...;^)...
All these where manually tracked using Red-Dot star finder with digital camera on 25mm eyepiece on a Nexstar8SE.When i fine tune my Sat-Tracker program,Look-out for Zero Blurred Shots up-coming with more Zooming!!
Hubble!!! currently its a 5am joker, that means early thirty an dew everywhere but tis possible...time'll tell....Enjoy!! an Clear Sky's!!!
Bozo
The 41st annual Riverside Telescope Makers Conference and Astronomy Expo took place on May 22 through May 25, 2009 (Memorial Day weekend) at Camp Oakes near Big Bear City. Located above the 7000 foot level, this well known Southern California astronomy event is held yearly at a YMCA campground nestled in the lush San Bernardino Mountains. Unlike last year, which an unexpected late season snow storm quickly brought RTMC 2008 to a standstill, we were blessed with clear skies, warmer days, cold nights and no Moon - just the right combinations for making a great star party. For 2009, Celestron did something different - we brought along our entire Engineering staff, in addition with representatives from Marketing and Product Management teams. We not only wanted to provide answers to technical questions that arose, but we also wanted to show our commitment towards listening to our customers. Yes, we do want to hear our customer's feedback and suggestions for future product improvements. After all, we're continually striving on taking our products to the next level as technology keeps evolving in the fast paced information age we currently live in.
Making its unofficial debut at RTMC 2009, Celestron unveiled a new optical system that corrects for off-axis coma and also delivers a flat field - qualities which are sought after by advanced astroimagers. Additional details will be announced in a future, upcoming web newsletter. To be on the mailing list, please refer to the Celestron homepage at www.celestron.com and sign up. Judging by the positive responses we received from guests who visited the Celestron booth, the future is looking very bright indeed. Also highlighting our booth this year included our two new Computerized German Equatorial Mounts - the new flagship CGE Pro and mid range CGEM series. Both mounts feature outstanding payload capacity, All-Star Polar alignment routines, Permanent Programmable Periodic Error Correction and so much more! What a perfect matchup that will go hand in hand.
During the nightly star parties, the Celestron tent was as busy as ever. With an abundant number of Celestron telescope operators on hand, nearly all the mounts, including those with the new optical tube systems, were lined up and scanning the night sky. Like each year at RTMC, the spring night sky turned into the summer night sky, as new constellations rose from the east as the hours wore on. Our targets included M13, M44, M51, M57, M65, M66, M81, M82, M92, M97, M100, M104 and more. The Veil nebula and NGC 4565 also did not disappoint. The skies were definitely better for viewing this year due to better transparency and seeing conditions. Several of our Engineers and Product Manager also conducted an imaging demonstration for several guests using a DSLR camera. The Whirlpool galaxy (M51) came out very impressively to everyone's delight.
On Saturday afternoon, Celestron founder, Tom Johnson, made his yearly trek to RTMC. This year was extra special for Tom because he was a featured speaker. It was a standing room only crowd of amateur and professional astronomers present, as Tom delivered his PowerPoint Presentation - "The Founding of Celestron." Accompanying Tom was his son, Dr. Greg Johnson, who helped run the laptop. Tom covered his humble beginnings of putting together an 8" telescope from a kit, to how his increased curiosity of telescopes led him to devise a way to mass produce the Schmidt corrector plate while making his telescopes affordable. At the conclusion of his presentation, some of the audience members came up to Tom and personally greeted and thanked him. It was really heartwarming to see how Tom's company has influenced so many people in the astronomical community, myself included. Today, his quest continues on, as one of Celestron's goals is to keep reaching out to a new generation of astronomical enthusiast from all across the globe!
That evening after dinner, the annual Merit Awards were given out, along with the raffle prizes that were donated from various organizations and vendors. I estimated well over 1000 people were gathered in front, inside and to the rear of the dining hall. The crowds were already pumped up, as I could hear the people in front and back of the hall making a lot of noise. Each location had their own cheering section, so as the raffle prizes got larger, so did their enthusiasm. Because Celestron was a gold sponsor this year, we drew last, as our NexStar 8 SE was up for grabs as the Grand Prize. After a brief motivational speech to see who was the loudest group (definitely in front), I called out the winning number. At first, the audience was silent, as I thought to myself "ok, we'll just draw again if nobody steps forward." Suddenly, someone called out "we have a winner out front," to the groans of disappointment from everyone inside. Sure enough, winner, Debbie Searle, from Encinitas, CA, came up to the stage and claimed her prize. She informed me that she's very active in Public Outreach, so the NexStar 8 SE will fit her needs quite nicely. We couldn't have been much happier to hear that. Way to go Debbie, and best wishes using your new scope to reach further out into the community.
For Celestron, this year's RTMC was quite a success. With booth traffic high, listening to positive feedback from customers and offering guests a "sneak peek" of what lays ahead, exciting times are definitely in store for Celestron. On an added note, RTMC Vendor Chairman, Allan Guthmiller, informed us that next year's RTMC will be taking place earlier next May, during New Moon instead of the traditional Memorial Day weekend. We're certain because of the date change to allow observing under darker sky conditions, will entice more people to come out to RTMC 2010. Just wait until you see what's in store for Celestron next year! I'll just leave it at that. Clear skies to all.
Well I bought a book on stargazin'. When I lived out away from the city years ago, I knew most of the Constellations. But over the years I got away from it. Well, this book I got lets you know what they look like, the names of the stars, and the other items located in the Constellations, such as Nebulas, Galaxies, etc.. Also let's you know the item's magnitudes, so I know what I can see and what I can't..
So startng all over again, but I'm having a good time!
Pre-Shuttle Launch Weekend Space-Foolery...
Friday,the 8th,i set to hunt Apollo moon landing sites..First up Saturn till the Moon clears the trees...
Full Moon Night...This full Moons name is Flower...
With a Full Moon out, i figure Great time to hunt Apollo mission moon landing sites (LZ's)....First up ,Apollo 11..Look for the crop circle looking Creators ,4 in a semi-circle ,Big to smallest...to the upper left the brightest creator in this shot
Second i hunted was Apollo 12's LZ...Good thing about Apollo 12 an 14 LZ's, there real close to each other..I got the LZ's centered frame as much as i could in all these shots..so the LZ's are mid-frame, one can use the creators around to help locate..Here's Apollo 12's LZ..
An lastly,Even more curious then the crop circle looking creators in the Apollo 11 shot..this Apollo 13 shot..There's three separate groups of creator hits, they all look the same, they go biggest to smallest in size too...you can easily see the biggest,the other's are to the right, the smallest is off frame..
A little after midnight...i heard an Crash, no tire squeal sound,then an Explosion!!.. i said to self, "Someone made a bad move somewhere",Looked at my handcontoler, an it re-set to pre-aliment mode,Yeap i lost power,The batteries in my batt. tray been dead for month..A/c's only way to stay contestant with a SE scope..1am , i paked it in an Processed.. Saturday, May 9th,09'..Tonight's mission that i cared to accept was an ISS pass...I set-up early, at 5:30pm est...My wake-up calls a Mocking Bird that's Guarding it's turf pre-dusk..no Early morning Roosters Allowed!!!...
I do a last check-up of weather,web-site favorites of observing idea's for the weekend,an last the Heavens-above.com print out of ISS info for later...an i'm Set-up.Algined on the Sun, an Catching a Tan..(if you look carefully, can see the girlfriend,her stance says it all...hehe)...
During daylight scoping,i Keep the CanonG10,un-mounted an with a zoom lens attached for terrestrial shots..
About an hour later,time to get more serious,out comes the lap-top an the cord for the handcontroler for the sat-tracker program i have...